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THE 


HISTORY 


UNITED  STATES  OF  NORTH  AMERICA. 


VOL.  I. 


THE 


HISTOEY 


THE  UNITED  STATES 

OF 

NORTH  AMERICA,/,  ^    ^ 

FROM   THB 

PLANTATION  OF  THE   BRITISH   COLONIES 

TILL 

THEIR  ASSUMPTION  OF  NATIONAL  INDEPENDENCE. 


By  JAMES  GRAHAME,  LL.  D. 


IN   FOUR   VOLUMES. 

VOL.  I. 

SECOND  EDITION,  ENLARGED  AND  AMENDED. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

LEA    AND    BLANCHARD 

1845. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1845,  by 

LEA  AND   BLANCHARD, 
in  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  Eastern  District  of  Pennsylvania. 


CAMBRIDGE: 

METCALF     AND     COMPANY, 
PRINTERS   TO  THE   UNIVERSITY. 


v.l 


PREFACE 


TO    THE 


AMERICAN    EDITION. 


IN  December,  1842,  the  undersigned  was  appointed  by  the 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society  "  to  prepare  a  Memoir  of 
Mr.  Grahame,  the  historian  of  the  United  States,"  who  had 
been  one  of  its  corresponding  members.  In  fulfilment  of 
that  duty,  he  entered  into  a  correspondence  with  Mr.  Gra- 
hame's  family  and  European  friends,  in  the  course  of  which 
he  learned  that  Mr.  Grahame  had  left,  at  his  death,  a  cor 
rected  and  enlarged  copy  of  his  "  History  of  the  United 
States  of  North  America,"  and  had  expressed,  among  his 
last  wishes,  an  earnest  hope  that  it  might  be  published  in  the 
form  which  it  had  finally  assumed  under  his  hand. 

This  information  having  been  communicated  to  Mr.  Justice 
Story,  Messrs.  James  Savage,  Jared  Sparks,  and  William 
H.  Prescott,  they  concurred  in  the  opinion,  that  it  "  scarcely 
comported  with  American  feelings,  interest,  or  self-respect 
to  permit  a  work  of  so  much  laborious  research  and  merit, 
written  in  a  faithful  and  elevated  spirit,  and  relating  to  our 
own  history,  to  want  an  American  edition,  embracing  the  last 
additions  and  corrections  of  its  deceased  author."  Influenced 
by  considerations  of  this  kind,  those  gentlemen,  in  connection 
kwith  the  undersigned,  undertook  the  office  of  promoting  and 
superintending  the  publication  of  the  work  in  its  enlarged  and 
amended  form.  A  copy,  prepared  "  from  that  left  by  the 
author,  was  accordingly  placed  at  their  disposal  by  his  son, 


vi  PREFACE  TO  THE  AMERICAN   EDITION. 

Robert  Grahame,  Esq.  ;  who  subsequently  transmitted  the 
original,  also,  to  be  deposited  in  the  library  of  Harvard  Uni 
versity.  The  supervision  of  the  work,  during  its  progress 
through  the  press,  devolved  on  the  undersigned,  —  a  charge 
which  he  has  executed  with  as  thorough  fidelity  to  Mr. 
Grahame  and  the  public  as  its  nature  and  his  official  engage 
ments  have  permitted. 

A  wish  having  been  intimated  by  the  son  of  Mr.  Grahame, 
that  the  Memoir,  prepared  at  the  request  of  the  Massa 
chusetts  Historical  Society,  should  be  prefixed  to  the  Ameri 
can  edition  of  the  History,  it  has  been  acceded  to.  The 
principal  materials  for  this  Memoir  —  consisting  of  extracts 
from  Mr.  Grahame's  diary  and  correspondence,  accompanied 
by  interesting  notices  of  his  sentiments  and  character  —  were 
furnished  by  his  highly  accomplished  widow,  his  son-in-law, 
John  Stewart,  Esq.,  and  his  friend,  Sir  John  F.  W.  Her- 
schel,  Bart.,  who  had  maintained  with  him  from  early  youth 
an  uninterrupted  intimacy.  Robert  Walsh,  Esq.,  the  present 
American  consul  at  Paris,  well  known  and  appreciated  in  this 
country  and  in  Europe  for  his  moral  worth  and  literary  em 
inence,  who  had  enjoyed  the  privilege  of  an  intimate  person 
al  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Grahame,  also  transmitted  many  of 
his  letters.  Like  favors  were  received  from  William  H. 
Prescott,  Esq.,  and  the  Rev.  George  E.  Ellis.  In  the  use 
of  these  materials,  the  endeavour  has  been,  as  far  as  possible, 
to  make  Mr.  Grahame's  own  language  the  expositor  of  .his 
mind  and  motives. 

The  portrait  prefixed  to  this  work  is  from  an  excellent 
painting  by  Healy,  engraved  with  great  fidelity  by  Andrews, 
one  of  our  most  eminent  artists  ;  the  cost  both  of  the  painting 
and  the  engraving  having  been  defrayed  by  several  American 
citizens,  who  interested  themselves  in  the  success  of  the 

present  undertaking. 

JOSIAH  QUINCY. 

CAMBRIDGE,  September  9,  1845. 


MEMOIR 


OF 


JAMES   GRAHAME,  LL.  D. 


JAMES  GRAHAME,  the  subject  of  this  Memoir,  was  born 
in  Glasgow,  Scotland,  on  the  21st  of  December,  1790,  of 
a  family  distinguished,  in  its  successive  generations,  by  intel 
lectual  vigor  and  attainments,  united  with  a  zeal  for  civil  lib 
erty,  chastened  and  directed  by  elevated  religious  sentiment. 

His  paternal  grandfather,  Thomas  Grahame,  was  eminent 
for  piety,  generosity,  and  talent.  Presiding  in  the  Admiralty 
Court,  at  Glasgow,  he  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  British 
judge  who  decreed  the  liberation  of  a  negro  slave  brought  into 
Great  Britain,  on  the  ground,  that  "a  guiltless  human  being, 
in  that  country,  must  be  free"  ;  a  judgment  preceding  by 
some  years  the  celebrated  decision  of  Lord  Mansfield  on  the 
same  point.  In  the  war  for  the  independence  of  the  United 
States,  he  was  an  early  and  uniform  opponent  of  the  preten 
sions  and  policy  of  Great  Britain  ;  declaring,  in  the  very  com 
mencement  of  the  contest,  that  "it  was  like  the  controversy 
of  Athens  with  Syracuse,  and  he  was  persuaded  it  would  end 
in  the  same  way." 

He  died  in  1791,  at  the  age  of  sixty,  leaving  two  sons, 
Robert  and  James.  Of  these,  the  youngest,  James,  was  es 
teemed  for  his  moral  worth,  and  admired  for  his  genius  ; 
delighting  his  friends  and  companions  by  the  readiness  and 
playfulness  of  his  wit,  and  commanding  the  reverence  of  all 
who  knew  him,  by  the  purity  of  a  life  under  the  guidance  of 


viii  MEMOIR. 

an  ever  active  religious  principle.  He  was  the  author  of  a 
poem  entitled  "  The  Sabbath,"  which,  admired  on  its  first 
publication,  still  retains  its  celebrity  among  the  minor  effusions 
of  the  poetic  genius  of  Britain. 

Robert,  the  elder  of  the  sons  of  Thomas  Grahame,  and 
father  of  the  subject  of  this  Memoir,  inheriting  the  virtues  of 
his  ancestors,  and  imbued  with  their  spirit,  has  sustained, 
through  a  long  life,  not  yet  terminated,  the  character  of  a  uni 
form  friend  of  liberty.  His  zeal  in  its  cause  rendered  him,  at 
different  periods,  obnoxious  to  the  suspicions  of  the  British 
government.  When  the  ministry  attempted  to  control  the 
expression  of  public  opinion  by  the  prosecution  of  Home 
Tooke,  a  secretary  of  state's  warrant  was  issued  against  him  ; 
from  the  consequences  of  which  he  was  saved  through  the 
acquittal  of  Tooke  by  a  London  jury.  When  Castlereagh's 
ascendant  policy  had  excited  the  people  of  Scotland  to  a  state 
of  revolt,  and  several  persons  were  prosecuted  for  high  trea 
son,  whose  poverty  prevented  them  from  engaging  the  best 
counsel,  he  brought  down,  at  his  own  charge,  for  their  defence, 
distinguished  English  lawyers  from  London,  they  being  deemed 
better  acquainted  than  those  of  Scotland  with  the  law  of  high 
treason  ;  and  the  result  was  the  acquittal  of  the  persons  indict 
ed.  He  sympathized  with  the  Americans  in  their  struggle  for 
independence,  and  rejoiced  in  their  success.  Regarding  the 
French  Revolution  as  a  shoot  from  the  American  stock,  he 
hailed  its  progress  in  its  early  stages  with  satisfaction  and  hope. 
So  long  as  its  leaders  restricted  themselves  to  argument  and 
persuasion,  he  was  their  adherent  and  advocate  ;  but  withdrew 
his  countenance,  when  they  resorted  to  terror  and  violence. 

By  his  profession  as  writer  to  the  signet l  he  acquired  for 
tune  and  eminence.  Though  distinguished  for  public  and  pri 
vate  worth  and  well  directed  talent,  his  political  course  exclud 
ed  him  from  official  power  and  distinction,  until  1833,  when, 

1  An  attorney. 


MEMOIR.  IX 

after  the  passage  of  the  Reform  Bill,  he  was  unanimously 
chosen,  at  the  age  of  seventy-four,  without  any  canvass  or 
solicitation  on  his  part,  at  the  first  election  under  the  reformed 
constituency,  Lord  Provost  of  Glasgow.  His  character  is 
not  without  interest  to  the  American  people  ;  for  his  son, 
whose  respect  for  his  talents  and  virtues  fell  little  short  of  ad 
miration,  acknowledges  that  it  was  his  father's  suggestion  and 
encouragement  which  first  turned  his  thoughts  to  writing  the 
history  of  the  United  States. 

Under  such  paternal  influences,  James  Grahame,  our  histo 
rian,  was  early  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  liberty.  His  mind 
became  familiarized  with  its  principles  and  their  limitations. 
Even  in  boyhood,  his  thoughts  were  directed  towards  that 
Transatlantic  people  whose  national  existence  was  the  work  of 
that  spirit,  and  whose  institutions  were  framed  with  an  express 
view  to  maintain  and  perpetuate  it. 

His  early  education  was  domestic.  A  French  emigrant 
priest  taught  him  the  first  elements  of  learning.  He  then 
passed  through  the  regular  course  of  instruction  at  the  Gram 
mar  School  of  Glasgow,  and  afterwards  attended  the  classes 
at  the  University  in  that  city.  In  both  he  was  distinguished 
by  his  proficiency.  After  pursuing  a  preparatory  course  in' 
geometry  and  algebra,  hearing  the  lectures  of  Professor  Play- 
fair,  and  reviewing  his  former  studies  under  private  tuition,  he 
entered,  about  his  twentieth  year,  St.  John's  College,  Cam 
bridge.  But  his  connection  with  the  University  was  short. 
In  an  excursion  during  one  of  the  vacations,  he  formed  an 
attachment  to  the  lady  whom  he  afterwards  married  ;  becom 
ing,  in  consequence,  desirous  of  an  early  establishment  in  life, 
he  terminated  abruptly  his  academical  connections,  and  com 
menced  a  course  of  professional  study  preparatory  to  his  ad 
mission  to  the  Scottish  bar. 

At  Cambridge  he  had  the  happiness  to  form  an  acquaint 
ance,  which  ripened  into  friendship,  with  Mr.  Herschel,  now 

VOL.  i.  b 


X  MEMOIR. 

known  to  the  world  as  Sir  John  F.  W.  Herschel,  Bart.,  and 
by  the  high  rank  he  sustains  among  the  astronomers  of  Europe. 
Concerning  this  friendship  Mr.  Grahame  thus  writes  in  his 
diary:  —  "It  has  always  been  an  ennobling  tie.  We  have 
been  the  friends  of  each  other's  souls  and  of  each  other's 
virtue,  as  well  as  of  each  other's  person  and  success.  He 
was  of  St.  John's  College,  as  well  as  I.  Many  a  day  we 
passed  in  walking  together,  and  many  a  night  in  studying  to 
gether."  Their  intimacy  continued  unbroken  through  Mr. 
Grahame's  life. 

In  June,  1812,  Mr.  Grahame  was  admitted  to  the  Scottish 
bar  as  an  advocate,  and  immediately  entered  on  the  practice  of 
his  profession.  It  seems,  however,  not  to  have  been  suited  to 
his  taste  ;  for  about  this  time  he  writes,  —  "  Until  now,  I  have 
been  my  own  master,  and  I  now  resign  my  independence  for 
a  service  I  dislike."  His  assiduity  was,  nevertheless,  un- 
remitted,  and  was  attended  with  satisfactory  success  ;  indica 
tive,  in  the  opinion  of  his  friends,  of  ultimate  professional 
eminence. 

In  October,  1813,  he  married  Matilda  Robley,  of  Stoke 
Newington,  a  pupil  of  Mrs.  Barbauld  ;  who,  in  a  letter  to  a 
friend,  wrote  concerning  her,  —  "She  is  by  far  one  of  the 
most  charming  women  I  have  ever  known.  Young,  beau 
tiful,  amiable,  and  accomplished  ;  with  a  fine  fortune.  She  is 
going  to  be  married  to  a  Mr.  Grahame,  a  young  Scotch 
barrister.  I  have  the  greatest  reluctance  to  part  with  this 
precious  treasure,  and  can  only  hope  that  Mr.  Grahame  is 
worthy  of  so  much  happiness." 

All  the  anticipations  justified  by  Mrs.  Barbauld's  exalted 
estimate  of  this  lady  were  realized  by  Mr.  Grahame.  He 
found  in  this  connection  a  stimulus  and  a  reward  for  his  pro 
fessional  exertions.  "  Love  and  ambition,"  he  writes  to  his 
friend  Herschel,  soon  after  his  marriage,  "  unite  to  incite  my 
industry.  My  reputation  and  success  rapidly  increase,  and  I 


MEMOIR.  Xi 

see  clearly  that  only  perseverance  is  wanting  to  possess  me  of 
all  the  bar  can  afford."  And  again,  at  a  somewhat  later 
period,  —  "You  can  hardly  fancy  the  delight  I  felt  the  other 
day,  on  hearing  the  Lord  President  declare  that  one  of  my 
printed  pleadings  was  most  excellent.  Yet,  although  you  were 
more  ambitious  than  I  am,  you  could  not  taste  the  full  enjoy 
ment  of  professional  success,  without  a  wife  to  heighten  your 
pleasure,  by  sympathizing  in  it." 

Soon  after  Mr.  Grahame's  marriage,  the  religious  princi 
ple  took  predominating  possession  of  his  mind.  Its  depth  and 
influence  were  early  indicated  in  his  correspondence.  As  the 
impression  had  been  sudden,  his  friends  anticipated  it  would  be 
temporary.  But  it  proved  otherwise.  From  the  bent  which 
his  mind  now  received  it  never  afterwards  swerved.  His 
general  religious  views  coincided  with  those  professed  by  the 
early  Puritans  and  the  Scotch  Covenanters  ;  but  they  were 
sober,  elevated,  expansive,  and  free  from  narrowness  and 
bigotry.  Though  his  temperament  was  naturally  ardent  and 
excitable,  he  was  exempt  from  all  tendency  to  extravagance  or 
intolerance.  His  religious  sensibilities  were  probably  quicken 
ed  by  an  opinion,  which  the  feebleness  of  his  physical  consti 
tution  led  him  early  to  entertain,  that  his  life  was  destined  to 
be  of  short  duration.  In  a  letter  to  Herschel,  about  this 
period,  he  writes,  —  "I  have  a  horror  of  deferring  labor  5  and 
also  such  fancies  or  presentiments  of  a  short  life,  that  I  often 
feel  I  cannot  afford  to  trust  fate  for  a  day.  I  know  of  no 
other  mode  of  creating  time,  if  the  expression  be  allowable, 
than  to  make  the  most  of  every  moment." 

Mr.  Grahame's  mind,  naturally  active  and  discursive,  could 
not  be  circumscribed  within  the  sphere  of  professional  avo 
cations.  It  was  early  engaged  on  topics  of  general  litera 
ture.  He  began,  in  1814,  to  write  for  the  Reviews,  and  his 
labors  in  this  field  indicate  a  mind  thoughtful,  fixed,  and  com 
prehensive,  uniting  great  assiduity  in  research  with  an  invinci- 


Xll  MEMOIR. 

ble  spirit  of  independence.  In  1816,  he  sharply  assailed 
Malthus,  on  the  subject  of  "  Population,  Poverty,  and  the 
Poor-laws,"  in  a  pamphlet  which  was  well  received  by  the 
public,  and  passed  through  two  editions.  In  this  pamphlet  he 
evinces  his  knowledge  of  American  affairs  by  frequently  al 
luding  to  them  and  by  quoting  from  the  works  of  Dr.  Franklin. 
Mr.  Grahame  was  one  of  the  few  to  whom  Malthus  conde 
scended  to  reply,  and  a  controversy  ensued  between  them  in 
the  periodical  publications  of  the  day.  In  the  year  1817,  his 
religious  prepossessions  were  manifested  in  an  animated  "De 
fence  of  the  Scottish  Presbyterians  and  Covenanters  against 
the  Author  of  '  The  Tales  of  my  Landlord'  "  ;  these  produc 
tions  being  regarded  by  him  "as  an  attempt  to  holdup  to 
contempt  and  ridicule  those  Scotchmen,  who,  under  a  galling 
temporal  tyranny  and  spiritual  persecution,  fled  from  their 
homes  and  comforts,  to  worship,  in  the  secrecy  of  deserts  and 
wastes,  their  God,  according  to  the  dictates  of  their  con 
science  ;  the  genius  of  the  author  being  thus  exerted  to  falsify 
history  and  confound  moral  distinctions."  Mr.  Grahame  also 
published,  anonymously,  several  pamphlets  on  topics  of  lo 
cal  interest;  "all,"  it  is  said,  "distinguished  for  elegance 
and  learning."  In  mature  life,  when  time  and  the  habit  of 
composition  had  chastened  his  taste  and  improved  his  judg 
ment, —  his  opinions,  also,  on  some  topics  having  changed, 
—  he  was  accustomed  to  look  back  on  his  early  writings 
with  little  complacency,  and  the  severity  with  which  he  applied 
self-criticism  led  him  to  express  a  hope  that  all  memory  of 
these  publications  might  be  obliterated.  Although  some  of 
them,  perhaps,  are  not  favorable  specimens  of  his  ripened  pow 
ers,  they  are  far  from  meriting  the  oblivion  to  which  he  would 
have  consigned  them. 

In  the  course  of  this  year  (1817),  Mr.  Grahame's  eldest 
daughter  died, — an  event  so  deeply  afflictive  to  him,  as  to 
induce  an  illness  which  endangered  his  life.  In  the  year  ensu- 


MEMOIR.  xiii 

ing,  he  was  subjected  to  the  severest  of  all  bereavements  in 
the  death  of  his  wife,  who  had  been  the  object  of  his  unlimited 
confidence  and  affection.  The  effect  produced  on  Mr.  Gra- 
hame's  mind  by  this  succession  of  afflictions  is  thus  noticed  by 
his  son-in-law,  John  Stewart,  Esq.:  —  "Hereafter  the  chief 
characteristic  of  his  journal  is  deep  religious  feeling  pervading 
it  throughout.  It  is  full  of  religious  meditations,  tempering  the 
natural  ardor  of  his  disposition ;  presenting  curious  and  instruc 
tive  records,  at  the  same  time  showing  that  these  convictions 
did  not  prevent  him  from  mingling  as  heretofore  in  general 
society.  It  also  evidences  that  all  he  there  sees,  the  events 
passing  around  him,  the  most  ordinary  occurrences  of  his  own 
life,  are  subjected  to  another  test,  —  are  constantly  referred  to 
a  religious  standard,  and  weighed  by  Scripture  principles. 
The  severe  application  of  these  to  himself,  —  to  self-examina 
tion, —  is  as  remarkable  as  his  charitable  application  of  them 
in  his  estimate  of  others." 

To  alleviate  the  distress  consequent  on  his  domestic  be 
reavements,  Mr.  Grahame  extended  the  range  of  his  intellec 
tual  pursuits.  In  1819,  he  writes,  —  "I  have  been  for  sev 
eral  weeks  engaged  in  the  study  of  Hebrew  ;  and,  having 
mastered  the  first  difficulties,  the  language  will  be  my  own  in  a 
few  months.  I  am  satisfied  with  what  I  have  done.  No 
exercise  of  the  mind  is  wholly  lost,  even  when  not  prosecuted 
to  the  end  originally  contemplated." 

For  several  years  succeeding  the  death  of  his  wife,  his 
literary  and  professional  labors  were  much  obstructed  by  pre 
carious  health  and  depressed  spirits.  His  diary  during  this 
period  indicates  an  excited  moral  watchfulness,  and  is  re 
plete  with  solemn  and  impressive  thoughts.  Thus,  in  April, 
1821,  he  remarks,  —  "In  writing  a  law-pleading  to-day,  I 
was  struck  with  what  I  have  often  before  reflected  on,  the 
subtle  and  dangerous  temptations  that  our  profession  presents 
to  us  of  varnishing  and  disguising  the  conduct  and  views  of 


XIV  MEMOIR. 

our  clients,  —  of  mending  the  natural  complexion  of  a  case, 
filling  up  its  gaps  and  rounding  its  sharp  corners."  And  in 
October  following, — "  Why  is  it  that  the  creatures  so  often 
disappoint  us,  and  that  the  fruition  of  them  is  sometimes 
attended  with  satiety  ?  We  try  to  make  them  more  to  us  than 
God  has  fitted  them  to  be.  Such  attempts  must  ever  be  in 
vain.  We  do  not  enjoy  them  as  the  gifts  and  refreshments 
afforded  us  by  God,  and  in  subordination  to  his  will  and 
purpose  in  giving.  If  we  did  so,  our  use  would  be  humble, 
grateful,  moderate,  and  happy.  The  good  that  God  puts  in 
them  is  bounded  ;  but  when  that  is  drawn  off,  their  highest 
sweetness  and  best  use  may  be  found  in  the  testimony  they 
afford  of  his  exhaustless  love  and  goodness."  And  again,  in 
February,  1822,  —  "We  are  all  travelling  to  the  grave, — 
but  in  very  different  attitudes  ; — some  feasting  and  jesting, 
some  fasting  and  praying ;  some  eagerly  and  anxiously  strug 
gling  for  things  temporal,  some  humbly  seeking  things  eternal." 

An  excursion  into  the  Low  Countries,  undertaken  for  the 
benefit  of  his  health,  in  1823,  enabled  Mr.  Grahame  to  grat 
ify  his  "strong  desire  to  become  acquainted  with  extrema  ves 
tigia  of  the  ancient  Dutch  habits  and  manners."  In  this  jour 
ney  he  enjoyed  the  hospitalities,  at  Lisle,  of  its  governor, 
Marshal  Cambronne,  and  formed  an  intimacy  with  that  noble 
veteran,  which,  through  the  correspondence  of  their  sympa 
thies  and  principles,  ripened  into  a  friendship  that  terminated 
only  with  life  itself. 

About  this  period  he  was  admitted  a  fellow  of  the  Royal 
Society  of  Edinburgh,  and  soon  after  began  seriously  to  con 
template  writing  the  history  of  the  United  States  of  North 
America.  Early  education,  religious  principle,  and  a  native 
earnestness  in  the  cause  of  civil  liberty  concurred  to  incline  his 
mind  to  this  undertaking.  He  was  reared,  as  we  have  seen, 
under  the  immediate  eye  of  a  father  who  had  been  an  early 
and  uniform  advocate  of  the  principles  which  led  to  American 


MEMOIR.  XV 

independence.  In  1810,  while  yet  but  on  the  threshold  of 
manhood,  his  admiration  of  the  illustrious  men  who  were  dis 
tinguished  in  the  American  Revolution  was  evinced  by  the 
familiarity  with  which  he  spoke  of  their  characters  or  quoted 
from  their  writings.  The  names  of  Washington  and  Franklin 
were  ever  on  his  lips,  and  his  chief  source  of  delight  was  in 
American  history.1  This  interest  was  intensely  increased  by 
the  fact,  that  religious  views,  in  many  respects  coinciding  with 
his  own,  had  been  the  chief  moving  cause  of  one  of  the 
earliest  and  most  successful  of  the  emigrations  to  North 
America,  and  had  exerted  a  material  effect  on  the  structure  of 
the  political  institutions  of  the  United  States.  These  combined 
influences  elevated  his  feelings  to  a  state  of  enthusiasm  on  the 
subject  of  American  history,  and  led  him  to  regard  it  as  "  the 
noblest  in  dignity,  the  most  comprehensive  in  utility,  and  the 
most  interesting  in  progress  and  event,  of  all  the  subjects  of 
thought  and  investigation."  In  June,  1824,  he  remarks  in  his 
journal,  —  "I  have  had  some  thoughts  of  writing  the  history 
of  North  America,  from  the  period  of  its  colonization  from 
Europe  till  the  Revolution  and  the  establishment  of  the  repub 
lic.  The  subject  seems  to  me  grand  and  noble.  It  was  not 
a  thirst  of  gold  or  of  conquest,  but  piety  and  virtue,  that  laid 
the  foundation  of  those  settlements.  The  soil  was  not  made 
by  its  planters  a  scene  of  vice  and  crime,  but  of  manly  enter 
prise,  patient  industry,  good  morals,  and  happiness  deserving 
universal  sympathy.  The  Revolution  was  not  promoted  by 
infidelity,  nor  stained  by  cruelty,  as  in  France  ;  nor  was  the 
fair  cause  of  Freedom  betrayed  and  abandoned,  as  in  both 
France  and  England.  The  share  that  religious  men  had  in 
accomplishing  the  American  Revolution  is  a  matter  well  de 
serving  inquiry,  but  leading,  I  fear,  into  very  difficult  discus 
sion." 

Although  his  predilections  for  the  task  wrere  strong,  it  is 

1  Sir  John  F.  W.  Herschel's  letters. 


Xvi  MEMOIR. 

apparent  that  he  engaged  in  it  with  many  doubts  and  after 
frequent  misgivings.  Nor  did  he  conceal  from  himself  the  pe 
culiar  difficulties  of  the  undertaking.  The  elements  of  the 
proposed  history,  he  perceived,  were  scattered,  broken,  and 
confused  ;  differently  affecting  and  affected  by  thirteen  inde 
pendent  sovereignties  ;  and  chiefly  to  be  sought  in  local  tracts 
and  histories,  hard  to  be  obtained,  and  often  little  known,  even 
in  America,  beyond  the  scenes  in  which  they  had  their  origin, 
and  on  which  their  light  was  reflected.  It  was  a  work  which 
must  absorb  many  years  of  his  life,  and  task  all  his  faculties. 
Not  only  considerations  like  these,  but  also  the  extent  of  the 
outline,  and  the  number  and  variety  of  details  embraced  in  his 
design,  oppressed  and  kept  in  suspense  a  mind  naturally  sensi 
tive  and  self-distrustful.  Having  at  length  become  fixed  in  his 
purpose, — chiefly,  there  is  reason  to  believe,  through  the 
predominating  influence  of  his  religious  feelings  and  views,  — 
on  the  4th  of  December,  1824,  he  writes  in  his  journal, — 
"  After  long,  profound,  and  anxious  deliberation,  and  much  pre 
paratory  research  and  inquiry,  I  began  the  continuous  (for  so  I 
mean  it)  composition  of  the  history  of  the  United  States  of 
North  America.  This  pursuit,  whether  I  succeed  in  it  or 
not,  must  ever  attract  my  mind  by  the  powerful  consideration, 
that  it  was  first  suggested  to  me  in  conversation  with  my  fa 
ther,  Mr.  Clarkson,  and  Mr.  Dillwyn."  And,  at  a  subsequent 
date, —  "May  God  (whom  I  have  invoked  in  the  work) 
bless,  direct,  and  prosper  my  undertaking !  The  surest  way 
to  execute  it  well  is  to  regard  it  always  as  a  service  of  body 
and  spirit  to  God ;  that  the  end  may  shed  its  light  on  the 
means."1  In  the  same  spirit,  he  writes  to  Mr.  Herschel,  on 
the  31st  of  December, — "For  a  considerable  time  I  have 

1  A  manuscript  journal  of  the  progress  of  this  History,  including  the  author 
ities  consulted,  was  sent  by  Mr.  Grahame,  in  the  year  1835,  to  the  President 
of  Harvard  College,  and  was  deposited  in  the  library  of  that  institution,  to 
which  it  now  belongs.  It  is  one  of  the  documents  used  in  the  preparation  of 
this  Memoir. 


MEMOIR.  XVH 

been  meditating  a  great  literary  work,  and,  after  much  prepar 
atory  reading,  reflection,  and  note-writing,  have  at  length 
begun  it.  If  I  continue  it,  as  I  hope  to  do,  it  will  absorb 
much  of  my  time  and  mind  for  many  years.  It  is  a  history  of 
North  America,  —  the  most  interesting  historical  subject,  I 
think,  a  human  pen  ever  undertook.  I  have  always  thought 
the  labors  of  the  historian  the  first  in  point  of  literary  dignity 
and  utility.  History  is  every  thing.  Religion,  science,  litera 
ture,  whatever  men  do  or  think,  falls  within  the  scope  of  histo 
ry.  I  ardently  desire  to  make  it  a  religious  work,  and,  in 
writing,  to  keep  the  chief  end  of  man  mainly  in  view.  Thus, 
I  hope,  the  nobleness  of  the  end  I  propose  may  impart  a 
dignity  to  the  means." 

The  undertaking,  once  commenced,  was  prosecuted  with 
characteristic  ardor  and  untiring  industry.  All  the  time  which 
professional  avocations  left  to  him  was  devoted  to  this  his 
favorite  field  of  exertion.  His  labors  were  continued  always 
until  midnight,  and  often  until  three  or  four  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  and  he  became  impatient  of  every  other  occupation. 
But  late  hours,  long  sittings,  and  intense  application  soon  seri 
ously  affected  his  health,  and  symptoms  of  an  overstrained 
constitution  gradually  began  to  appear.  Of  this  state  of  mind, 
and  of  these  effects  of  his  labors  on  his  health,  his  letters  give 
continual  evidence.  "  I  am  becoming  increasingly  wedded  to 
my  historical  work,  and  proportionally  averse  to  the  bar  and 
forensic  practice.  At  half  past  three  this  morning  I  desist, 
from  motives  of  prudence  (tardily  operating,  it  must  be  con^ 
fessed)  rather  than  from  weariness."  —  "Sick  or  well,  my 
History  is  the  most  interesting  and  absorbing  employment  I 
have  ever  found.  It  is  a  noble  subject."  1 

By  application  thus  active  and  incessant,  the  first  volume 
of  his  work,  comprehending  the  history  of  the  settlement  of 

1  Letters  to  Herschel,  January  and  February,  1825. 
VOL.    I.  C 


xviii  MEMOIR. 

Virginia  and  New  England,  was  so  nearly  completed  early  in 
the  ensuing  May,  as  to  admit  of  his  then  opening  a  negotiation 
for  its  publication.  In  a  letter  to  Longman,  his  bookseller, 
Mr.  Grahame  expresses  in  the  strongest  terms  his  devotedness 
to  the  undertaking,  and  adds,  —  "  Every  day  my  purpose  be 
comes  stronger  to  abandon  every  other  pursuit,  in  order  to 
devote  to  this  rny  whole  time  and  attention." 

He  now  immediately  set  about  collecting  materials  for  his 
second  volume.  Having  ascertained  that  in  England  it  was 
impossible  to  obtain  books  essential  to  the  success  of  his 
historical  researches,  and  that  rich  treasures  in  the  depart 
ment  of  American  history  were  deposited  at  Gottingen,  he 
undertook  a  journey  to  that  city,  and  found  in  its  library 
many  very  valuable  materials  for  his  work.  To  these 
resources  his  attention  had  been  directed  by  Sir  William 
Hamilton,  whose  "  unwearied  labors  in  supplying  him  with 
information  on  the  subject  of  his  historical  work,  and  whose 
interest  in  its  success,"  he  gratefully  acknowledges  in  his 
letters  ;  adding,  —  "To  him  nothing  is  indifferent  that  con 
cerns  literature,  or  the  interests  of  his  friends."  During 
Mr.  Grahame 's  short  residence  on  the  continent  of  Europe, 
his  mother,  to  whom  he  was  tenderly  attached,  died  ;  and  he 
returned  to  England  in  the  following  September  (1825)  under 
a  heavy  depression  of  spirits.  He  resumed,  however,  his  fa 
vorite  labors,  but,  in  consequence  of  the  failure  of  his  health, 
was  soon  obliged  to  desist. 

"  The  latter  part  of  1825  and  the  beginning  of  1826," 
his  friend  Herschel  states,  "  was  passed  by  Mr.  Grahame  in 
London,  under  pressure  of  severe  and  dangerous  as  well  as 
painful  illness,  the  exhausting  and  debilitating  effects  of  which 
were  probably  never  obliterated  from  his  constitution,  and 
which  made  it  necessary  for  him  to  seek  safety  in  a  milder 
climate  than  that  of  Scotland.  Thither,  however,  he  for  a 
while  returned,  but  only  to  write  in  a  strain  like  the  following  : 


MEMOIR.  XIX 

— '  Whitehill,  April  24,  1826.  My  bodily  health  is  nearly 
reestablished  ;  but  my  mind  is  in  a  wretched  state  of  feeble 
ness  and  languor,  and  indifference  to  almost  every  thing.  My 
History  is  completely  at  a  stand.  The  last  month  has  been 
the  most  disagreeable  of  my  life.  If  I  am  not  to  undergo 
some  great  change  in  the  state  of  my  faculties,  I  do  sincerely 
hope  my  life  may  not  be  long.  My  discontent  and  uneasiness 
are,  however,  mitigated  by  the  thought,  that  our  condition  is 
appointed  by  God,  and  that  there  must  be  duties  attached  to  it, 
and  some  degree  of  happiness  connected  with  the  performance 
of  those  duties.  Surely,  the  highest  duty  and  happiness  of  a 
created  being  must  arise  from  a  willing  subservience  to  the 
designs  of  the  Creator.'  " 

Being  apprized  by  his  physicians  that  an  abode  in  Scot 
land  during  another  winter  would  probably  prove  fatal  to  him, 
he  transferred  his  residence  to  the  South  of  England,  and 
thenceforth,  abandoning  his  profession  of  advocate,  devoted 
himself  exclusively  to  the  completion  of  his  historical  work, 
as  appears  by  the  following  entry  in  his  diary  :  —  "  March, 
1826.  Edinburgh.  I  am  now  preparing  to  strike  my  tent, 
that  is,  dissolve  my  household  and  depart  for  ever  from  this 
place  ;  my  physicians  requiring  me  not  to  pass  another  winter 
in  the  climate  of  Scotland.  I  quit  my  profession  without  re 
gret,  having  little  liked  and  greatly  neglected  it  ever  since  I 
undertook  the  history  of  America,  to  which  I  shall  be  glad  to 
devote  uninterruptedly  all  my  energies,  as  soon  as  I  succeed 
in  re-collecting- them." 

His  journal  bears  continued  testimony  to  the  deep  interest 
he  took  in  every  thing  American,  and  the  philosophic  views 
which  he  applied  to  the  condition  and  duties  of  the  people 
of  the  United  States.  —  "American  writers  are  too  apt  to 
accept  the  challenge  of  Europeans  to  competitions  quite  un 
suitable  to  their  country.  Themistocles  neither  envied  nor 
emulated  the  boast  of  the  flute-player,  to  whose  challenge  he 


XX  MEMOIR. 

answered  :  '  I  cannot,  indeed,  play  the  flute  like  you  ;  but  I 
can  transform  a  small  village  into  a  great  city.'  From  evils  of 
which  America  is  happily  ignorant  there  arise  some  partially 
compensating  advantages,  which  she  may  very  well  dispense 
with.  Titular  nobility  and  standing  armies,  for  example,  de- 
velope  politeness  and  honor  (not  honor  of  the  purest  and 
noblest  kind)  among  a  few,  at  the  expense  of  depraving  and 
depressing  vast  multitudes.  Great  inequalities  of  wealth,  the 
bondage  of  the  lower  classes,  have  adorned  European  realms 
with  splendid  castles  and  cathedrals,  at  the  expense  of  lodging 
the  mass  of  society  in  garrets  and  hovels.  If  American 
writers  should  succeed  in  persuading  their  countrymen  to 
study  and  assert  equality  with  Europeans,  in  dramatic  enter 
tainments,  in  smooth  polish  of  manners,  and  in  those  arts 
which  profess  to  enable  men  to  live  idly  and  uselessly,  with 
out  wearying,  they  will  form  a  taste  inconsistent  with  just  dis 
cernment  and  appreciation  of  their  political  institutions.  Ves 
pasian  destroyed  the  palace  of  Nero,  as  a  monument  of  luxury 
and  pernicious  to  morals.  The  absence  of  such  palaces  as 
Trianon  and  Marly  may  well  be  compensated  by  exemption 
from  such  tyranny  as  the  revocation  of  the  edict  of  Nantes, 
which  was  coeval  with  their  erection." 

Of  Mrs.  Trollope's  "  Domestic  Manners  of  the  Ameri 
cans,"  and  her  depreciating  view  of  "  the  society  which  he 
regarded  with  love,  admiration,  and  hope,"  he  thus  writes  in  a 
subsequent  page  of  his  journal: — "What  is  truth?  Is  it 
not  as  much  in  the  position  of  the  observer  as  in  the  condition 
of  the  observed  ?  Mrs.  Trollope  seems  to  me  full-fraught 
with  the  most  pitiful  vulgarities  of  aristocralical  Ignorance  and 
pretension  ;  and  these  would  naturally  invite  the  shock  of 
what  she  seems  to  have  met  with  in  the  antipathy  of  demo 
cratic  insolence  and  coarseness  ;  —  she  is  Basil  Hall  in  petti 
coats.  Think  of  such  a  brace  of  pragmatical  pretenders  and 
adventurers  as  he  and  she,  sitting  in  judgment  on  America  !  " 


MEMOIR.  XXl 

It  is  impossible  not  to  remark  the  delight  his  mind  took  in 
any  associations  connected  with  America.  "  At  the  printing- 
office  of  Messrs.  Strahan  and  Spottiswoode,"  he  writes,  "  I 
corrected  a  proof-sheet  of  my  History  of  North  America, 
sitting  within  the  walls  of  that  establishment  where  Franklin 
once  teas  a  workman."  Again,  at  Kensington  : — "I  delight 
to  stroll  amid  the  sombre  grandeur  of  these  gardens.  The 
lofty  height  and  deep  shade  of  these  magnificent  trees  inspire 
a  pleasing,  solemn,  half-melancholy  gloom.  Here  Penn  and 
Addison  walked.  Here  Rousseau,  when  in  England,  was 
wont  to  sit  and  muse.  Sometimes,  in  spirit,  I  meet  their 
spirits  here." 

The  first  two  volumes  of  his  work,  bringing  the  narrative 
down  to  the  period  of  the  English  Revolution,  being  at  length 
completed,  were  in  February,  1827,  published.  But  Mr. 
Grahame  was  now  destined  to  sustain  a  severe  disappointment. 
His  History  was  received  with  little  interest  by  the  British 
public,  and  by  all  the  greater  Reviews  with  neglect.  The 
Edinburgh,  the  Quarterly,  and  the  Foreign  Quarterly  main 
tained  towards  it  an  ominous  silence.  Some  of  the  minor 
Reviews,  indeed,  noticed  it  with  qualified  approbation.  For 
Englishmen  the  colonial  history  of  the  United  States  had  but 
few  attractions ;  and  the  spirit  in  which  Mr.  Grahame  had 
treated  the  subject  was  not  calculated  to  gratify  their  national 
pride.  He  was  thought  to  have  "  drunk  too  deep  of  the  spirit 
of  the  Puritans  "  ;  it  was  said  that  his  "  hatred  of  tyranny 
had  terminated  in  aversion  to  monarchy,"  —  that  towards  the 
church  of  England  "  his  feelings  were  fanatical,"  towards  the 
church  of  Rome  "  illiberal  and  intolerant." 

Conscious  of  the  labor  he  had  bestowed  upon  it,  and  of 
the  fidelity  with  which  it  was  executed,  Mr.  Grahame  was  not 
disheartened  by  the  chilling  reception  his  work  met  with  from 
the  British  public,  nor  deterred  from  pursuing  his  original 
design  ;  the  conviction  predominating  in  his  mind,  that  sooner 


XXU  MEMOIR. 

or  later  it  would  conciliate  public  esteem.  Accordingly,  in 
the  autumn  of  the  same  year  in  which  his  first  two  volumes 
were  published,  he  not  only  commenced  their  revision,  but 
began  an  extension  of  his  History  to  the  period  of  the  declara 
tion  of  American  independence.  His  interest  in  his  subject 
evidently  increased.  "  American  history,"  he  writes,  "  is  my 
favorite  field."  —  "I  am  averse  to  all  other  occupation."  — 
"  I  am  pleased  to  gather  from  any  quarter  wherewith  to  deco 
rate  my  beloved  North  America."  —  "  God  bless  the  people 
and  institutions  of  North  America  !  So  prays  their  warm 
friend,  and  obscure,  but  industrious,  historian." 

About  this  time,  through  the  kindness  of  James  Chalmers, 
nephew  of  the  late  George  Chalmers,  he  obtained  admission 
to  the  library  of  that  distinguished  American  annalist.  The 
treasures  there  opened  to  him  rekindled  his  zeal,  and  he  re 
newed  his  historical  labors  with  an  intense  assiduity,  ill  com 
porting  with  the  critical  state  of  his  health.  Apprehending  a 
fatal  termination  of  his  disease,  his  medical  advisers  urged  him 
to  pass  the  ensuing  winter  at  the  island  of  Madeira  ;  and  thither 
his  friend  Herschel,  through  anxiety  for  his  life,  offered  to 
accompany  him.  But  no  consideration  could  induce  him  to 
leave  England,  where  alone  the  researches  which  occupied  his 
mind  could  be  pursued  with  advantage  ;  and  for  the  purpose  of 
availing  himself  of  the  books  on  American  history  which  Lon 
don  afforded,  he  established  himself  in  the  vicinity  of  that  city. 

In  May,  1828,  Mr.  Grahame  visited  Paris,  accompanied 
by  his  father,  who  introduced  him  to  La  Fayette.  "  I  was  re 
ceived,"  he  writes,  "  by  this  venerable  and  illustrious  man 
with  the  greatest  kindness.  His  face  expresses  grave,  mild, 
peaceful  worth,  the  calm  consciousness  and  serene  satisfaction 
of  virtue.  I  was  charmed  with  his  dignified  simplicity,  his 
mild  but  generous  benevolence,  and  the  easy,  gentle,  superior 
sense  and  virtue  of  his  thinking."  From  Paris,  Mr.  Grahame 
travelled  with  his  father  along  the  banks  of  the  Loire,  visited 


MEMOIR.  xxiii 

Nantes,  renewed  his  acquaintance  with  Marshal  and  Madame 
Cambronne,  and  spent  some  days  in  their  family.  "  The 
modest,  simple,  chivalrous  character  of  Marshal  Cambronne," 
says  Mr.  Stewart,  "  attracted  Mr.  Grahame's  esteem  and  ad 
miration,  and  strengthened  those  ties  of  mutual  interest  and 
attachment  which  their  former  intercourse  had  originated." 

Returning  to  the  neighbourhood  of  London  in  June  follow 
ing,  his  health  recruited  by  his  excursion,  he  immediately  re 
sumed,  with  characteristic  ardor,  his  favorite  historical  pursuits. 
At  this  time  the  Catholic  emancipation  question  strongly  agi 
tated  the  British  nation,  and  Mr.  Grahame's  ardent  love  of 
liberty  and  religious  toleration  excited  in  him  a  keen  interest  in 
the  success  of  this  measure.  Having  found  the  climate  of 
Nantes  adapted  to  his  constitution,  and  enabling  him,  as  he 
expressed  himself,  "to  labor  night  and  day  at  his  historical 
work,"  he  returned  to  that  city  in  October  of  the  same  year, 
and  fixed  his  residence  there  during  the  ensuing  winter  and 
spring. 

In  May,  1829,  on  his  homeward  journey,  he  passed  through 
Paris,  again  visited  La  Fayette,  and  saw  him  in  the  midst  of  his 
family,  "surrounded,"  he  writes,  "by  a  troop  of  friends, 
some  of  distinguished  character  and  aspect,  and  all  regarding 
him  with  respect  and  admiration.  Thus  serene  is  the  evening 
of  his  troubled  but  glorious  life."  Mr.  Grahame  adds:  — 
"  I  had  the  honor  and  happiness  of  long  and  most  inter 
esting  conversations  with  him,  respecting  the  origin  and  com 
mencement  of  his  connection  with  the  American  cause. 
Nothing  could  be  more  friendly,  kind,  or  benevolent  than  his 
manners  ;  nothing  more  instructive,  entertaining,  or  interesting 
than  the  conversation  he  bestowed  upon  me.  How  mild, 
wise,  and  good  La  Fayette  is  !  Mr.  Clarkson  described  him 
to  me  as  a  man  who  desires  the  happiness  of  the  human  race, 
in  consistence  with  strict  subservience  to  the  cause  of  truth  and 
the  honor  of  God.  I  deem  this  a  very  honorable  diploma. 


XXIV  MEMOIR. 

In  the  company  of  La  Fayette,  I  feel  an  elevation  of  spirit 
and  expansion  of  heart.  What  a  roll  of  great  deeds,  heroic 
virtues,  and  interesting  scenes  is  engraven  on  the  lines  of  the 
venerable  face  of  the  prisoner  of  Olmutz  !  " 

From  these  and  other  conversations  Mr.  Grahame  acknowl 
edges  that  he  derived  the  materials  for  various  passages  in  the 
text  and  notes  of  the  fourth  volume  of  his  History  of  the 
United  States.  This  work  he  finished  in  December,  1829. 
The  intense  labor  which  he  had  applied  to  its  completion 
brought  on  a  severe  nervous  fever,  which,  for  a  short  time, 
threatened  a  fatal  result. 

In  April,  1830,  Mr.  Grahame  was  married,  at  Nantes,  to 
Jane  A.  Wilson,  daughter  of  the  Rev.  John  Wilson,  the  Prot 
estant  pastor  of  that  city.  Concerning  this  connection,  John 
Stewart,  Esq.,  his  son-in-law,  thus  writes: — "From  this 
period  till  his  death,  Mr.  Grahame 's  home  was  at  Nantes  ; 
and  in  the  society  of  his  pious,  amiable,  and  accomplished 
wife,  and  under  her  tender  and  vigilant  care,  Mr.  Grahame 
enjoyed  a  degree  of  tranquil  happiness  and  renewed  health 
to  which  he  had  been  long  a  stranger  ;  —  interrupted  only,  at 
times,  by  his  tendency  to  excessive  literary  exertion  ;  but  at  a 
later  period  more  seriously  and  permanently,  by  the  dangerous, 
lingering,  and  almost  hopeless  illness  of  his  daughter.  Be 
tween  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Grahame  existed  the  most  devoted  at 
tachment,  based  upon  a  complete  appreciation  of  and  profound 
esteem  for  each  other's  qualities  and  principles.  They  were 
both  interesting,  even  in  appearance  ;  tall  and  well  propor 
tioned  ;  —  their  features  bearing  the  impress  of  a  happy  seri 
ousness,  while  their  demeanour  evinced  that  peculiarly  attrac 
tive  stamp  of  real  gentility  which  Christian  principles  add  to 
natural  good-breeding." 

After  his  marriage,  Mr.  Grahame  resided  for  several  years 
at  L'Eperonniere,  an  ancient  chateau  in  the  environs  of  Nantes  ; 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Wilson,  the  aged  parents  of  his  wife,  being  in- 


MEMOIR.  XXV 

mates  of  his  family.  "  Through  their  long  standing  con 
nections,"  continues  Mr.  Stewart,  "  Mr.  Grahame  found  him 
self  at  once  in  the  best  French  society  of  Nantes.  There 
the  worth  of  his  character  soon  made  itself  respected.  The 
interest  he  took  in  every  thing  affecting  the  welfare  of  the  city 
(to  which,  if  necessary,  he  was  accustomed  liberally  to  sub 
scribe)  ,  the  urbanity  of  his  demeanour  in  his  intercourse  with 
individuals,  united  with  the  generosity  of  his  disposition,  soon 
caused  him  to  be  regarded  more  in  the  light  of  a  fellow-citizen 
than  as  a  stranger  ;  and  in  process  of  time  all  such  local  dis 
tinctions  as  his  numerous  friends  could  bestow  upon  him,  or 
induce  him  to  accept,  were  conferred  on  him.  The  influence 
he  thus  acquired  was  chiefly  and  successfully  exerted  in  the 
support  of  the  small  but  increasing  church  professing  the 
Protestant  faith  at  Nantes.  To  several  Frenchmen  residing 
at  Nantes  Mr.  Grahame  became  warmly  attached  ;  but  though 
his  spirit  of  general  benevolence  led  him  to  take  a  warm  in 
terest  in  those  among  whom  he  lived,  and  notwithstanding  he 
saw  much  among  the  French  to  admire  and  respect,  yet  the 
character  of  his  mind  and  habits,  staid,  serious,  and  retired, 
did  not  permit  his  feelings  towards  that  country  to  approach 
to  any  thing  like  the  warmth  of  his  affection  and  admiration 
for  either  America  or  England." 

Although  Mr.  Grahame  had  finished  writing  his  History 
in  December,  1829,  he  was  far  from  regarding  it  as  ready  for 
the  press.  He  attributed  the  ill  success  of  his  first  two  vol 
umes  to  the  haste  with  which  they  had  been  published  ;  he 
therefore  resolved  to  devote  several  years  to  the  revision  of 
the  entire  work,  and  often  expressed  a  doubt  of  its  publication 
in  his  lifetime. 

Nearly  four  years  had  now  elapsed  since  the  appearance  of 
Mr.  Grahame's  volumes,  yet  the  general  silence  concerning 
them  had  not  been  broken  by  any  voice  from  this  side  of  the 
Atlantic.  The  high  price  of  the  English  edition  rendered  any 

VOL.   i.  d 


XXVI  MEMOIR. 

considerable  circulation  in  this  country  hopeless  ;  and  Amer 
ican  editors  were  yet  to  learn  that  it  was  possible  for  a  for 
eigner  and  a  Briton  to  treat  the  early  history  of  the  United 
States  with  fairness  and  impartiality.  The  knowledge  of  the 
nature  and  true  value  of  this  composition  was  confined  to 
a  few  individuals.  At  length,  in  January,  1831,  a  just  and 
discriminating  critical  notice  of  the  work  appeared  in  the  North 
American  Review.  After  expressing  regret  at  the  neglect 
with  which  it  had  hitherto  been  treated  in  America,  and  point 
ing  out  the  causes  of  the  little  interest  it  had  excited  in  this 
country,  the  reviewer  proceeds  to  do  justice  to  the  independent 
spirit  of  the  author;  to  his  freedom  from  prejudice  ;  to  "the 
happy  discrimination  he  had  manifested  in  the  selection  of  the 
leading  principles  that  led  to  the  colonization  of  the  several 
States,  and  the  able  exposition  of  the  results  that  followed"  ; 
and  to  his  having  "  corrected,  with  a  proper  boldness,  the  mis 
takes,  whether  of  ignorance  or  malignity,  which  his  predecessors 
in  the  same  labors  had  committed."  The  reviewer  adds, — 
"  Mr.  Grahame,  with  a  spirit  able  to  appreciate  the  value  of  his 
subject,  has  published  what  we  conceive  to  be  the  best  book  that 
has  anywhere  appeared,  upon  the  early  history  of  the  United 
States."  "He  has  not  invariably  avoided  error,  but  he  has 
coped  very  successfully  with  the  disadvantages  of  his  situa 
tion."  This  is  believed  to  be  the  first  time  Mr.  Grahame's 
History  had  been  made,  either  in  America  or  Europe,  the 
special  subject  of  notice  in  any  leading  Review. 

This  high  commendation  of  the  two  volumes  then  published 
appears  by  his  journal  to  have  been  "  very  gratifying  "  to  Mr. 
Grahame,  and  to  have  encouraged  him  to  proceed  with  the 
revision  and  preparation  of  his  extended  work.  While,  under 
this  new  incitement,  he  was  assiduously  employed  in  re- 
examining  the  details  of  his  History,  and  exerting  himself  to 
render  it  as  accurate  as  possible,  he  was  interrupted  by  events 
which  filled  his  domestic  circle  with  grief  and  anxiety.  In 


MEMOIR.  XXV11 

May,  1833,  the  death  of  his  wife's  mother,  Mrs.  Wilson,  for 
whom  he  entertained  an  affection  truly  filial,  was  immediately 
followed  by  the  dangerous  illness  of  his  only  daughter.  Her 
physicians,  both  in  France  and  England,  having  declared  that 
her  life  depended  upon  a  change  of  climate,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Grahame  immediately  accompanied  her  to  Madeira  ;  whence, 
after  a  residence  of  nine  months,  they  returned,  her  restora 
tion  being  now  deemed  hopeless.  She  eventually  recovered, 
however,  in  a  manner  "  incomprehensible  and  unparalleled  in 
medical  experience,"  and  ultimately  attained  a  state  of  fair 
and  permanent  health,  to  which  the  assiduous  attention  of 
her  excellent  mother-in-law  greatly  contributed. 

On  his  return  from  Madeira,  Mr.  Grahame  first  heard  of 
the  death  of  La  Fayette,  to  whose  memory  he  pays  the  fol 
lowing  tribute  in  his  diary  :  —  "  La  Fayette  is  dead  !  This 
'  sun  of  glory '  is  blotted  from  the  political  firmament,  which 
he  has  so  long  adorned.  Every  honest  and  generous  breast 
must  '  feel  the  sigh  sincere  '  for  the  loss  of  this  great  man,  — 
the  extinction  of  an  effulgence  of  honor,  virtue,  and  wisdom 
so  benignly  bright.  Fully  and  beautifully  did  he  exemplify 
the  words  of  Wolsey  :  '  Love  thyself  last,'  and  '  Corruption 
wins  not  more  than  honesty.'  He  drew  his  last  breath,  and 
ceased  to  be  a  part  (how  honored,  how  admirable  a  part  !) 
of  human  nature,  at  an  early  hour  on  the  twentieth  of  this 
month  [May],  at  the  age  of  nearly  seventy-seven.  Pity  that 
his  last  days  must  have  been  embittered  by  the  existing  dis 
sensions  in  his  beloved  America  !  Of  the  human  beings  I 
have  known,  and  knowing  have  regarded  with  unmingled  ven 
eration,  there  exist  now  only  Mr.  Clarkson  and  my  father. 
It  seems  strange  to  me  that  La  Fayette  should  be  no  more,  — 
that  such  an  illustrious  ornament  of  human  nature  should  dis 
appear,  and  yet  the  world  continue  so  like  what  it  was  be 
fore.  Yet  the  words  '  La  Fayette  is  dead'  will  cause  a  keen 
sensation  to  vibrate  through  every  scene  of  moral  and  intel- 


xxviii  MEMOIR. 

lectual  being  on  earth.  A  thousand  deep  thoughts  and  earnest 
remembrances  will  awaken  at  that  name,  over  which  ages  of 
renown  had  gathered,  while  yet  its  owner  lived  and  moved 
and  had  his  being  among  us.  France,  in  losing  this  man, 
seems  to  me  to  have  lost  the  brightest  jewel  in  her  national 
diadem,  and  to  have  suffered  an  eclipse  of  interest  and  glory." 

During  his  residence  in  Madeira,  Mr.  Grahame  continued 
the  revision  of  his  History,  and  on  his  return,  after  devoting 
another  year  to  the  same  object,  he  took  up  his  residence 
in  London  for  the  purpose  of  superintending  its  publication. 
Here,  again,  his  anxiety  and  unremitting  industry  induced  a 
dangerous  illness.  His  restoration  to  health  he  attributed  to 
the  assiduous  care  of  two  of  his  friends,  Mrs.  Reid  and  Dr. 
Boott.  The  former  took  him  from  his  hotel  to  her  own 
house,  and  thus  secured  for  him  retirement,  quiet,  and  her 
undivided  attention.  "  From  her,"  he  says,  "  I  have  received 
the  most  comfortable  and  elegant  hospitality,  the  kindest  and 
most  assiduous  care,  and  conversation  seasoned  with  genius, 
piety,  and  benevolence,  and  the  finest  accomplishments  of  ed 
ucation."  Concerning  Dr.  Boott,  who  is  a  native  of  Boston, 
Massachusetts,  established  as  a  physician  in  London,  Mr. 
Grahame  remarks  in  his  diary,  —  "  His  knowledge  is  great  ; 
his  abilities  excellent ;  his  flow  of  thought  incessant  ;  his 
heart  and  dispositions  admirable.  He  insists  that  his  val 
uable  attendance  upon  me  be  accepted  as  friendly,  and  not 
remunerated  as  professional,  service.  In  this  man,  America 
has  sent  me  one  of  her  noblest  sons,  to  save  the  life  of  her 
historian." 

After  an  interruption  of  six  weeks,  Mr.  Grahame  resumed 
the  revision  of  the  proof-sheets  of  his  work  ;  and  in  Decem 
ber,  having  finished  this  labor,  returned  to  his  family,  at 
Nantes.  In  the  ensuing  January  (1836),  his  History  was 
published. 

Eleven   years   had   now  elapsed  since  Mr.   Grahame  had 


MEMOIR. 


commenced  writing  the  History  of  the  United  States.  More 
earnest  and  assiduous  research  had  seldom  been  exerted  by 
any  historian.  His  interest  in  the  subject  was  intense.  His 
talents  were  unquestionable.  There  was  no  carelessness  in 
the  execution,  no  haste  in  the  publication.  A  Briton,  highly 
educated,  universally  respected,  of  a  moral  and  religious  char 
acter  which  gave  the  stamp  of  authority  to  his  statements 
and  opinions,  had  devoted  the  best  years  of  his  life  to  the 
task  of  introducing  his  countrymen  and  the  world  to  an  'ac 
quaintance  with  the  early  fortunes  of  a  people  who  had  risen 
with  unparalleled  rapidity  to  a  high  rank  among  the  nations 
of  the  earth  ;  yet  a  second  time  his  work  was  received  with 
neglect  by  those  literary  Reviews  in  Great  Britain  which 
chiefly  guide  the  public  taste,  and  distribute  the  rewards 
and  honors  of  literary  industry.  Although  highly  wrought, 
elevated  in  sentiment,  generous  and  noble  in  its  design, 
all  its  views  and  influences  made  subservient  to  the  cause 
of  pure  morals  and  practical  piety,  yet,  as  has  been  already 
observed,  it  was  obviously  not  adapted  to  conciliate  either 
the  prejudices,  the  feelings,  or  the  interests  of  the  British 
people.  It  could  not  well  be  expected,  that,  under  an  Epis 
copal  hierarchy,  whose  Roman  Catholic  origin  and  tenden 
cies  are  manifest,  a  history  of  successful  Puritanism  would  be 
favorably  received.  It  could  not  be  hoped,  that,  in  a  nation 
which  had  risen  to  the  height  of  civilization  and  power  under 
a  monarchy  based  on  an  aristocracy,  a  work  illustrative  and 
laudatory  of  institutions  strictly  republican  would  be  counte 
nanced,  —  much  more,  generally  patronized.  Mr.  Grahame, 
moreover,  had  not  only  imbibed  the  political  principles  of 
the  Puritans,  but  had  caught  much  of  their  devotional  spirit. 
Hence  his  language,  at  times,  is  ill  suited  to  the  genius  of 
an  age  which  does  not  regard  religion  as  the  great  business  of 
life,  nor  the  extension  of  its  influences  as  one  of  the  appro 
priate  objects  of  history.  Owing  to  these  causes,  his  work 


XXX  MEMOIR. 

received  little  encouragement  in  Europe,  and  the  knowledge 
of  its  claims  to  respect  and  attention  was  limited.  Nor  were 
these  consequences  confined  to  Great  Britain.  American 
readers  commonly  rely  on  the  leading  Reviews  of  that  coun 
try  for  notices  of  meritorious  productions  of  British  authors, 
and  are  not  apt  to  make  research  after  those  which  they  neglect 
or  depreciate.  As  Mr.  Grahame  belonged  to  no  political  or 
literary  party  or  circle,  he  was  without  aid  from  that  personal 
interest  and  zeal  which  often  confer  an  adventitious  popularity. 
He  trusted  the  success  of  his  work  wholly  to  its  own  merits, 
and,  when  disappointed  a  second  time,  neither  complained 
nor  was  discouraged,  —  supported,  as  before,  by  a  conscious 
ness  of  his  faithful  endeavours,  and  by  a  firm  belief  in  their 
ultimate  success.  He  had  assumed  the  whole  pecuniary  risk 
of  his  extended  publication,  in  four  volumes  octavo,  which 
resulted  in  a  loss  of  one  thousand  pounds  sterling,  —  and  that, 
at  a  time,  as  he  states,  when  it  was  not  easy  for  him  to  sus 
tain  it.  Taking  no  counsel  of  despondency,  however,  he  im 
mediately  began  to  prepare  for  a  second  edition  of  his  entire 
work,  and  devoted  to  it,  during  the  remaining  years  of  his 
life,  all  the  time  and  strength  which  a  constitutional  organic 
disease  permitted. 

Hitherto,  Mr.  Grahame's  interest  in  America  had  been  de 
rived  from  the  study  of  her  history  and  institutions  ;  but  in 
1837  he  formed  an  acquaintance  with  a  few  distinguished 
Americans,  and  received  from  them  the  respect  due  to  his 
historical  labors.  Among  these  was  Robert  Walsh,  Esq., 
who,  after  a  brilliant  and  effective  literary  career  in  this 
country,  had  transferred  his  residence  to  Paris  ;  by  him  Mr. 
Grahame  was  introduced  to  Washington  Irving.  Both  these 
eminent  Americans  united  in  urging  him  to  write  the  history  of 
the  American  Revolution  ;  Mr.  Walsh  offering  to  procure  for 
him  materials,  and  a  sufficient  guaranty  against  pecuniary  loss. 

Under   this   influence   he   now   entered   upon  a  course  of 


MEMOIR.  XXXI 

reading  embracing  that  period  of  American  history  ;  but,  as 
may  be  gathered  from  the  general  tenor  of  his  subsequent 
remarks  and  the  result,  more  from  curiosity  and  interest  in 
the  subject  than  from  any  settled  purpose  of  writing  upon  it ; 
for  early  in  August  of  this  year  (1837),  he  observes  in  his 
diary,  —  "Mr.  Walsh,  in  his  letters  to  me,  renews  his 
urgency  that  I  should  write  the  history  of  the  Revolutionary 
War.  But  I  think  I  have  done  enough  as  a  historian,  and 
that  a  prudent  regard  to  my  own  reputation  bids  me  rather 
enforce  my  title  than  enlarge  my  claim  to  public  attention." 
And  about  the  same  time  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Walsh,  —  "I 
cannot  agree  with  you  in  thinking  that  our  beloved  America 
will  regard  with  equal  complacency  a  historic  garland  attached 
to  her  brows  by  foreign  hands,  and  one  in  which  a  son  of 
her  own  blends  his  own  renown  with  hers."  Yet,  from  a 
letter  to  the  same  gentleman  in  September  following,  it  is 
evident  that  Mr.  Grahame  entertained  a  strong  predilection 
for  the  design  ;  for  he  thus  writes  :  —  "  The  more  I  pursue 
my  present  American  studies,  the  more  I  am  struck  with  a 
pleasing  astonishment.  The  account  of  the  formation  of  the 
federal  constitution  of  North  America  inspires  me  with  delight 
and  admiration.  I  knew  but  the  outline  of  the  scene  before. 
Now,  I  find  that  the  more  its  details  are  examined,  the  more 
honorable  and  interesting  it  proves.  Truly  does  it  deserve  to 
be  termed  the  greatest  scene  of  human  glory  that  ever  adorn 
ed  the  tide  of  human  time.  I  wish,  that,  ere  my  health  and 
spirit  had  been  broken,  I  had  ventured  to  be  the  historian  of 
that  scene.  But  surely  the  country,  the  magna  mater  virum, 
that  has  produced  such  actors  and  such  deeds,  is  herself  des 
tined  to  afford  their  fittest  historian."  In  a  similar  strain  he 
writes  in  his  journal,  under  the  same  date,  — "  The  account 
(by  Pitkin  and  others),  which  I  am  reading,  of  the  formation 
of  the  federal  constitution  of  North  America,  after  the  achieve 
ment  of  her  national  independence,  fills  me  with  astonishment 


XXX11  MEMOIR. 

and  admiration.  It  would  make  me  glad  to  be  convinced 
that  the  present  people  of  America  and  their  leaders  are  al 
together  such  as  were  the  Americans  of  those  days.  Far 
more  was  gained  to  America  (and  through  her,  I  hope,  event 
ually  to  the  whole  world)  by  the  wisdom,  virtue,  and  mod 
eration  exhibited  by  her  children  after  the  War  of  Independ 
ence,  than  by  the  valor  that  brought  that  war  to  its  happy 
close.  Such  a  scene  the  history  of  no  other  country  ever 
exhibited.  I  wish  I  had  been  its  historian.  But  a  fit  histo 
rian  will  surely  arise  one  day." 

Botta,  who  had  written  the  history  of  the  American  Rev 
olution,  died  about  this  time  in  Paris.  Mr.  Graharne's  feel 
ings  were  deeply  moved  by  the  event.  "  I  hope,"  he  wrote 
in  his  diary,  "  that  the  Americans  at  Paris  attended  his  fu 
neral.  Though  only  in  heart  an  American,  I  would  have  de 
sired  leave  to  attend,  had  I  been  there."  And  in  a  letter 
to  Mr.  Walsh,  he  remarks,  —  "I  hope  some  memoir  of  Botta 
will  appear.  It  should  gratify  Americans  to  learn,  that,  on 
his  death-bed,  he  related  (it  was  to  myself),  that  his  son,  in 
some  distant  part  of  the  world,  received  civilities  from  the 
officers  and  crew  of  an  American  vessel,  who  instantly  rec 
ognized  as  a  friend  the  son  of  the  historian  of  their  coun 
try, —  adding,  '  That  was  a  rich  reward  of  my  labors.'  When 
I  told  him  that  Jefferson  had  expressed  admiration  of  his 
work,  he  squeezed  my  hand  and  testified  much  delight.  And 
when  I  told  him  that  both  Jefferson  and  John  Adams  con 
demned  his  speeches  as  fictitious,  he  smiled,  and  answered  with 
naivete,  '  They  are  not  wholly  invented.'  " 

Mr.  Walsh  having,  in  conversation,  expressed  to  Mr.  Gra- 
hame  his  surprise  at  the  partiality  he  evinced  for  his  country 
and  countrymen,  he  replied,  —  "As  Hannibal  was  taught  by 
his  father  to  hate  the  Romans,  so  was  I  trained  by  mine  to 
love  the  Americans."  And,  in  writing  to  that  gentleman  in 
October,  1837,  he  remarks,  in  the  same  spirit,  —  "  I  regret, 


MEMOIR.  XXX111 

when  I  see  the  defence  of  America  conducted  with  recrim 
ination  against  Great  Britain.  But  I  must  confess  that  my 
own  indignation  at  the  conduct  and  language  of  some  of  my 
countrymen  towards  America  is  at  times  uncontrollable.  I 
wish  that  Americans  could  regard  these  follies  with  indul 
gence,  or  magnanimous  (perhaps  disdainful)  indifference.  For 
my  part,  I  can  truly  say,  that  my  daughter  is  hardly  dearer 
to  me  than  America  and  American  renown." 

His  admiration  of  the  character  of  Washington  is  thus  ex 
pressed  in  his  journal,  under  the  date  of  September,  1837  :-*• 
"  O,  what  a  piece  of  work  of  divine  handicraft  was  Wash 
ington  !  What  a  grace  to  his  nation,  his  age,  and  to  human 
nature  was  he  !  I  know  of  no  other  military  and  political 
chief  who  has  so  well  supported  the  character  delineated  in 
these  lines  of  Horace  :  — 

1  Justum  ac  tenacem  propositi  virum 
Non  civium  ardor  prava  jubentium, 
Non  vultus  instantis  tyranni, 
Mente  quatit  solida.' 

With  the  same  feeling  that  tempted  the  clergyman,  who  read 
the  funeral  service  over  the  body  of  John  Wesley,  to  sub 
stitute,  for  the  formula,  '  our  dear  brother  here  departed,'  the 
words,  '  our  dear  father  here  departed,'  I  am  inclined  to  re 
gard  Washington  rather  as  a  father  than  a  brother  of  his  fel 
low-men.  What  a  master,  what  a  pupil,  were  Washington 
and  La  Fayette  !  One  day,  when  I  was  sitting  with  La  Fay- 
ette,  he  said  to  me,  '  I  was  always  a  republican,  and  Wash 
ington  was  always  my  model  and  my  master.'"  During  the 
same  month,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Walsh,  —  "  Washington  im 
presses  me  with  so  much  veneration,  that  I  have  become 
more  than  ever  anxious  to  know  what  really  was  the  state 
and  complexion  of  his  religious  opinions  "  ;  and  recurring,  in 
a  subsequent  letter,  to  the  same  topic,  he  remarks,  —  "I 
find  McGuire's  '  Religious  Opinions  and  Character  of  Wash 
ington  '  heavy,  tiresome,  and,  in  general,  unsatisfactory.  But 
VOL.  i.  e 


XXXIV  MEMOIR. 

last  night  I  reached  a  passage  which  gave  me  lively  delight ; 
for  now  I  can  look  on  Washington  as  a  Christian." 

Until  near  the  close  of  this  year,  Mr.  Grahame  continued 
to  pursue  his  researches  on  the  subject  of  the  American  Rev 
olution,  although  laboring  under  a  constant  depression  of  health 
and  spirits,  and  a  prevailing  apprehension  that  his  life  would 
be  short,  and  that  his  constitutional  disorders  were  symptom 
atic  of  sudden  death.  But  in  December,  1837,  his  physi 
cians  prohibited  him  from  "  writing  or  reading  for  some 
months,  on  any  subject  likely  to  provoke  much  thinking  "  ; 
and  on  the  1 9th  of  this  month,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Walsh,  that 
he  had  reason  to  attribute  his  recent  illness  to  his  "  late  his 
toric  studies,  and  to  the  anxiety  of  mind  earnest  meditation 
had  induced."  "  For  me  to  undertake  such  a  work,"  he  says, 
"  or  even  contemplate  it,  or  diligently  prepare  for  it,  until  my 
health  be  totally  renovated  (which,  in  all  human  probability, 
it  never  will  be),  would,  I  clearly  see,  be  to  do  to  the  sub 
ject  and  to  myself  unreasonable  injustice.  /  therefore  re 
nounce  it  altogether.  I  hope  you  will  not  blame  me,  nor 
regret  the  trouble  you  have  taken  and  the  kindness  you  have 
shown  me  with  the  view  of  my  prosecuting  the  career  from 
which  I  have  now  retreated.  For  a  long  time  before  I  had 
the  pleasure  of  your  acquaintance,  I  had  resolved,  from  a 
sense  of  both  moral  and  physical  incompetency,  as  well  as 
on  account  of  the  slenderness  of  my  success,  the  heaviness 
of  my  pecuniary  loss,  and  other  considerations,  to  carry  my 
historic  narrative  no  farther.  It  was  your  flattering  encour 
agement  —  the  laus  laudati  viri  —  that  tempted  me  to  mis 
take  an  agreeable  vision  for  a  reasonable  hope,  and  to  em 
brace  the  purpose  I  must  now  painfully,  but  decidedly,  forego. 

4  Hos  successus  alit :  possunt  quia  posse  videntur.' 

Neither  category  was  mine.  I  had  no  success  to  sustain 
me,  and  no  internal  confidence  to  impel  me  ;  but  the  very 
reverse." 

•  "•>•  -»•    *<•'•» 


MEMOIR.  XXXV 

The  charge  of  "  invention,"  preferred  against  Mr.  Gra- 
hame  by  Mr.  Bancroft,  in  his  History,1  on  account  of  the 
epithet  "  baseness  "  applied  by  him  to  the  conduct  of  Clarke, 
the  agent  of  Rhode  Island,  in  negotiating  for  that  colony  the 
charter  it  obtained  in  1663  from  Charles  the  Second,  first 
came  to  Mr.  Grahame's  knowledge  early  in  the  year  1838, 
and  excited  in  him  feelings  of  surprise  and  a  deep  sense  of 
wrong.  "  There  is  here,"  he  immediately  wrote  to  Mr. 
Walsh,  "  a  plentiful  lack  of  the  kindness  I  might  have  ex 
pected  from  an  American,  and  of  the  courtesy  which  should 
characterize  a  gentleman  and  a  man  of  letters.  I  had  de 
served  even  severer  language,  if  the  invention  with  which  I 
am  charged  were  justly  laid  to  me.  But  the  imputation  is 
utterly  false.  —  I  have  written  under  the  guidance  of  author 
ities,  on  which  I  have,  perhaps  erringly,  certainly  honestly, 
relied.  I  would  rather  be  convicted  of  the  grossest  stupidity, 
than  of  the  slightest  degree  of  wilful  falsification  ;  for  I  greatly 
prefer  moral  to  intellectual  merit  and  repute."  A  defence 
against  this  attack  upon  Mr.  Grahame's  veracity  as  a  histo 
rian  was  soon  after  published  by  Mr.  Walsh  in  "  The  New 
York  American "  ;  and  was  succeeded  by  another,  from 
Mr.  Grahame  himself,  in  the  same  paper. 

Mr.  Bancroft,  in  a  subsequent  edition  of  his  History,2 
silently  withdrew  the  charge  of  "  invention,"  and  substituted 
in  its  stead  that  of  "  unwarranted  misapprehension."  It  is 
not  apparent  how  this  charge  is  more  tenable  than  was  the 
other. 

Mr.  Grahame's  strictures  on  Clarke's  conduct  in  the  ne 
gotiation  referred  to  drew  upon  him  the  animadversions  of 
"some  of  the  literati  of  Rhode  Island."  Through  them,  he 
became  acquainted  with  the  intrinsic  worth  of  Clarke's  gen 
eral  character,  and  readily  acknowledged  him  to  be  "a  true 

1  Vol.  II.,  p.  64,  edit.  1837.  *  Vol.  II.,  p.  64,  edit.  1841. 


XXXVI  MEMOIR. 

patriot  and  excellent  man,  and  well  deserving  the  reverence 
of  his  natural  and  national  posterity."  Yet'  Mr.  Grahame's 
mind  was  so  deeply  and  unalterably  impressed  with  the  opin 
ion,  that  Clarke  had  exceeded  "  the  line  of  honor  and  in 
tegrity  "  in  that  negotiation,  that  he  appears  to  have  been 
unable  to  reconcile  it  to  his  sense  of  truth,  as  a  historian, 
wholly  to  exonerate  his  conduct  from  censure.  Accordingly, 
in  the  present  edition  of  his  History,1  Mr.  Grahame  thus  al 
ters  the  sentence  which  had  occasioned  the  animadversions  al 
luded  to  :  —  u  The  envoy  conducted  his  negotiation  with  a  sup 
pleness  of  adroit  servility,  that  rendered  the  success  of  it  dearly 
bought "  ;  implying  that  Clarke,  in  suing  for  favors  under  such 
pretences  as  he  urged  to  obtain  them,  had  exhibited  a  "  ser 
vile  "  spirit,  "  supple  "  in  respect  of  policy,  and  "  adroit  "  in 
the  color  he  gave  to  the  facts  on  which  he  based  his  hopes  of 
success  ;  and  intimating  that  he  could  find  no  other  apology  for 
his  conduct,  than  u  the  aptitude  even  of  good  men  to  be  trans 
ported  beyond  the  line  of  honor  and  integrity,  in  conducting 
such  negotiations  as  that  which  was  confided  to  Clarke."2 

1  See  Vol.  I.,  p.  322. 

*  It  is  due  to  the  subject  of  this  Memoir  here  to  inquire  into  those  gen 
eral  facts  and  circumstances  which  led  Mr.  Grahame  (the  tenor  of  whose 
mind  towards  the  people  of  the  United  States  was  kind,  candid,  and  laud 
atory)  to  express  so  strongly  and  adhere  so  perseveringly  to  the  opinion  he 
had  formed  concerning  Clarke's  conduct  in  the  negotiation  above  adverted  to. 

At  the  time  of  Clarke's  negotiation,  Massachusetts  and  Rhode  Island  were 
both  present  by  deputy  at  the  court  of  Charles  the  Second,  —  both  moved  alike 
by  fear  ;  Massachusetts  of  the  king,  being  apprehensive  it  was  his  intention  to 
vacate  her  old  charter ;  Rhode  Island  of  Massachusetts,  who  had  shown  a  dis 
position  to  extend  her  jurisdiction  over  territory  which  Rhode  Island  claimed, 
as  also  to  interfere  with  the  local  government  and  religious  liberties  of  this 
colony.  It  was  no  motive  of  loyalty  that  induced  the  appearance  of  either  of 
them  at  court ;  nor  was  there  any  thing  in  their  previous  history  which  could 
entitle  the  deputies  of  either  colony  to  vaunt  any  sentiment  of  this  sort  on  the 
part  of  their  constituents. 

In  this  state  of  things,  and  notwithstanding  "  Rhode  Island  had  solicited  and 
accepted  a  patent  from  the  Long  Parliament,  in  the  commencement  of  its 
struggles  with  Charles  the  First,  while  Massachusetts  declined  to  make  a  sim 
ilar  recognition,  even  when  the  Parliament  was  at  the  utmost  height  of  its 
power  and  success,"  (Grahame,  I.,  323,)  —  Chalmers  represents  Clarke  as 


MEMOIR.  XXXV11 

From  Mr.  Grahame's  position  as  a  distant  observer,  his 
views  of  character  and  events  may  sometimes  conflict  with 
those  entertained  in  this  country  ;  yet  his  spirit  is  wholly 

boasting  of  the  loyalty  of  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island,  and,  in  order  to 
depreciate  Massachusetts  in  the  opinion  of  King  Charles  the  Second,  and  exalt 
Rhode  Island,  as  challenging  the  deputies  of  the  former  colony  "  to  display  any 
one  act  of  duty  or  loyalty  shown  by.  their  constituents  to  Charles  the  First  or 
to  the  present  king,  from  their  first  establishment  in  New  England."  "  The 
challenge  thus  confidently  given,"  adds  Chalmers,  "  was  not  accepted."  — Po 
litical  tfnnals  of  the  United  Colonies,  p.  273.  — The  agents  of  Massachusetts 
would  not  condescend,  for  the  sake  even  of  saving  their  charter,  to  feign  a  sen 
timent  which  they  were  sensible  had  no  existence.  Their  silence,  under  such 
circumstances,  it  is  impossible  for  any  fair  mind  not  to  honor  and  approve. 

Furthermore,  Chalmers  states  that  the  Rhode-Islanders  "  procured  from  the 
chiefe  of  the  Narragansets  a  formal  surrender  of  their  country,  which  was 
afterwards  called  the  King's  Province,  to  Charles  the  First,  in  right  of  his 
crown,"  and  that  their  "  deputies  boasted  to  Charles  the  Second  of  the  merits  of 
this  transaction."  —  Ibid.  — Now,  in  point  of  fact,  the  name  of  King's  Province 
was  not  given  to  the  Narraganset  country  until  1666,  three  years  after  Clarke's 
negotiation  ;  —  see  Collections  of  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society,  Vol.  IV., 
p.  69; — and  in  respect  of  the  surrender  of  the  Narraganset  country,  Gorton,  who 
was  the  chief  agent  in  receiving  it,  explicitly  states,  that  it  was  self-moved  on 
the  part  of  the  Indians ;  that  they  sent  to  the  colonists  and  voluntarily  offered  it ; 
and  does  not  pretend  that  the  Rhode-Islanders  had  any  further  agency  in  the 
affair  than  encouraging  the  disposition  of  the  Indians  to  make  the  surrender, 
aiding  them  in  doing  it  in  legal  form,  and  promising  to  transmit  their  deed  and 
desire  of  protection  to  the  English  government.  —  See  Gorton's  Simplicities 
Defence,  pp.  79-81. 

In  view  of  Clarke's  hollow  pretences  of  loyalty  on  the  part  of  his  constitu 
ents,  and  the  supposititious  proofs  of  it  adduced  by  him,  it  is  not  wonderful 
that  a  mind  like  that  of  Mr.  Grahame  should  have  become  immovably  fixed 
in  the  opinion,  that  the  conduct  of  the  Rhode  Island  deputy  was  not  reconcil 
able  with  truth  and  integrity,  and  that  it  was  unbecoming  a  historian  who 
meant  to  be  just,  and  was  conscious  of  being  impartial,  to  refrain  from  express 
ing  with  fidelity  the  convictions  forced  upon  him  by  a  knowledge  of  the  facts 
and  circumstances. 

Clarke  was  unquestionably  faithful  to  his  agency.  He  acted  according  to  the 
views  and  wishes  of  his  constituents,  and  in  vaunting  their  loyalty  prob 
ably  followed  their  instructions ;  he  was  therefore  fully  entitled  to  all  the 
thanks  they  expressed,  and  all  the  honors  they  conferred  upon  him.  A  Christian 
moralist,  like  Grahame,  who  had  drunk  deep  of  "Siloa's  brook,  which  flowed 
fast  by  the  oracles  of  God,"  naturally  can  allow  no  compromise  with  truth  for 
the  sake  of  effect  or  success,  and  must  unavoidably  apply  to  the  conduct  of 
men,  whether  acting  as  private  individuals  or  as  public  agents,  one  and  the 
same  pure  and  elevated  moral  standard  ;  a  strictness  of  moral  principle,  which, 
it  must  be  confessed,  in  respect  of  public  agents,  the  customs  and  opinions  of 
the  world  do  not  regard  as  either  practicable  or  politic. 


XXXV111  MEMOIR. 

American,  and  it  is  his  desire  and  delight  to  do  justice  to 
the  actors  in  the  scenes  he  describes.  The  high  moral 
tone,  and  the  ever  active,  all-controlling  religious  principle 
and  feeling,  which  pervade  his  work,  inspire  the  strongest 
confidence  in  all  that  he  writes  ;  and  it  seems  impossible  for 
any  one,  in  the  exercise  of  a  sound  and  unprejudiced  judg 
ment,  to  believe  that  a  mind  impelled  by  motives  so  pure  and 
elevated,  having  no  personal  ends  to  serve,  no  party  pur 
poses  to  answer,  could,  under  any  circumstances,  knowingly 
warp  the  truth,  invent  or  suppress  facts,  or  give  to  them  any 
false  or  delusive  coloring.  Mr.  Grahame  never  visited  the 
United  States,  and  his  opportunities  for  intercourse  with  its 
citizens  were  few  ;  but  he  spared  neither  time,  labor,  nor 
expense  to  acquaint  himself  with  the  authentic  materials  of  its 
history  ;  he  laid  the  public  libraries  of  Scotland,  England, 
France,  and  Germany  under  contribution  to  the  completeness 
and  accuracy  of  his  work  ;  and  if  he  has  occasionally  fallen 
into  mistakes,  they  are  either  such  as  all  historians,  who  rely 
for  their  facts  on  the  authority  of  others,  are  subject  to,  or 
such  as  might  naturally  be  expected  under  the  peculiar  cir 
cumstances  of  the  case,  —  being  chiefly  on  points  of  local 
history,  in  their  nature  of  little  interest  or  importance  beyond 
the  immediate  sphere  or  the  particular  persons  they  affect  ; 
and  when  traced  to  their  sources,  it  will  often  be  found  that 
even  into  these  he  was  led  by  authorities  whose  errors  have 
been  detected  only  by  recent  research,  in  some  instances  sub 
sequent  to  the  publication  of  his  volumes. 

In  February,  1839,  Mr.  Grahame  writes  to  Mr.  Walsh, 
—  "  You  propose  (and  deeply  I  feel  the  honor  and  kindness 
of  the  proposal)  to  have  an  American  edition  of  my  work 
published  at  Philadelphia.  Now,  pray,  ponder  wisely  and 
kindly  these  suggestions.  Much  as  I  should  otherwise  like 
a  republication  of  my  work  in  America,  I  could  not  enjoy  it, 
4  with  unreproved  pleasure  free,'  if  I  thought  it  would  be  at 


MEMOIR.  XXXIX 

all  disagreeable  to  Mr.  Bancroft,  or  that  it  would  be  construed 
in  America  as  a  competitory  challenge  of  an  English  to  an 
American  writer.  Let  there  be,  if  it  be  necessary  or  profit 
able,  a  rivalry  (a  generous  one)  between  England  and  America. 
But  I  am  far  too  much  Americanized  to  think,  without  chagrin 
and  impatience,  of  my  seeming  the  rival  (the  foreign  rival)  of 
a  great  American  writer.  Dear  to  me  is  the  fame  of  every 
man  whose  fame  is  interwoven  with  the  fame  of  America,  and 
whose  career  tends  to  justify  to  myself  and  to  the  world  the  de 
lightful  feelings  of  admiration  and  hope  with  which  she  inspires 
me."  And,  in  a  subsequent  letter  on  the  same  topic,  he  writes 
to  the  same  correspondent,  — "  Most  sincerely  do  I  wish  that 
an  American  may  prove  the  great,  the  conclusive,  and  the 
lasting  historian  of  America.  I  shall  be  content,  if  of  my 
work  some  Englishmen  and  perhaps  a  few  Americans  say, 
'  -So  thought  an  Englishman  who  loved  his  country,  but  affect 
ed  still  more  warmly  the  cause  of  truth,  justice,  and  univer 
sal  human  welfare.'" 

In  his  correspondence  with  this  gentleman  during  this  and 
the  ensuing  year,  the  American  bias  of  his  mind  appears  on 
almost  every  occasion  and  every  subject.  Intermingled  with 
this,  we  continually  meet  with  manifestations  of  that  all-per 
vading  religious  sentiment,  and  of  that  tenderness  of  the  do 
mestic  affections,  which  constituted  the  most  striking  and  beau 
tiful  elements  of  his  character.  Thus,  in  congratulating  Mr. 
Walsh  on  the  restored  health  of  his  "wife,"  he  remarks, — 
"  They  say  that  Americans,  in  general,  say  lady  and  female, 
when  we  say  wife  and  woman.  Now,  I  reckon  wife,  woman, 
and  mamma  to  be  the  three  loveliest  words  in  the  English 
language."  And,  writing  concerning  his  having  completed 
the  forty-ninth  year  of  his  age,  he  adds,  —  "  The  period  of 
life,  at  which,  I  believe,  Aristotle  fixes  the  decline  of  human 
abilities.  I  would  give  all  the  abilities  I  have,  and  ten  times 
more,  if  I  had  them,  for  a  deep,  abiding  sense  of  piety  and 


Xl  MEMOIR. 

the  love  of  God.  May  that,  my  dear,  kind  friend,  be  yours 
and  mine  !  And  can  we  wish  a  happier  portion  to  those 
whom  we  love  ?  All  else  fades  away." 

In  the  course  of  this  year  (1839),  a  highly  laudatory  re 
view  of  the  "  History  of  the  United  States"  was  read  before 
the  Royal  Academy  of  Nantes,  by  M.  Malherbe,  in  which 
its  merits  were  analyzed  and  acknowledged  ;  and  Mr.  Gra- 
hame  was,  in  consequence,  unanimously  elected  a  member  of 
the  Academy. 

In  August,  of  the  same  year,  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws 
was  conferred  on  Mr.  Grahame  by  the  Corporation  and  Over 
seers  of  Harvard  University.  It  was  the  first  public  evidence 
of  respect  he  had  received  from  this  side  of  the  Atlantic  ;  and 
it  drew  from  him  unqualified  expressions  of  satisfaction.  In  a 
letter  to  the  Rev.  George  E.  Ellis,  of  Massachusetts,  in  No 
vember  following,  he  writes,  —  "  Harvard  College  has  long 
been  a  spot  round  which  my  heart  hovered. 

'  Ille  terrarum  mihi  prater  omnes 
Angulus  ridet.' 

Now,  indeed,  it  is  doubly  dear  to  me  ;  for  I  feel  myself,  in  a 
manner,  one  of  its  sons..  The  view  of  the  College  buildings  in 
Peirce's  History  awakened  and  detained  my  fondest  regards. 
May  truth,  virtue,  and  happiness  flourish  within  those  walls, 
and  beam  forth  from  them  to  the  divine  glory  and  human  wel 
fare  !  Though  somewhat  broken  by  years  and  infirmities,  I 
yet  cherish  the  hope  to  see  Harvard  University  before  I  die." 
In  a  letter  to  Mr.  Walsh,  in  October  following,  he  thus  refers 
to  the  same  topic  : —  "I  am  now  an  American.  Your  dear 
country  has  adopted  me.  Never  let  me  hear  again  of  America 
or  Americans  owing  any  thing  to  me.  I  am  the  much  indebted 
party.  I  feel  with  the  keenest  sensibility  the  honor  that  Har 
vard  University  has  conferred  upon  me." 

The  writer  of  a  critical  notice  of  Bancroft's  History  of  the 


MEMOIR.  xli 

United  States,  in  the  North  American  Review,  for  January, 
1841,  introduced  some  incidental  remarks  on  that  of  Mr.  Gra- 
hame.  After  bearing  testimony  to  his  capacity,  though  a  for 
eigner,  to  appreciate  the  motives  and  institutions  of  the  Puri 
tans,  and  acknowledging  the  fidelity  and  candor,  the  extent  and 
accuracy,  of  his  researches,  the  critic  adds,  —  "  Mr.  Grahame's 
work,  with  all  its  merit,  is  the  work  of  a  foreigner.  And  that 
word  comprehends  much  that  cannot  be  overcome  by  the  best 
writer.  He  may  produce  a  beautiful  composition,  faultless  in 
style,  accurate  in  the  delineation  of  prominent  events,  full  of 
sound  logic  and  most  wise  conclusions.  But  he  cannot  enter 
into  the  sympathies,  comprehend  all  the  minute  feelings,  preju 
dices,  and  peculiar  ways  of  thinking,  which  form  the  idiosyncrasy 
of  the  nation." 

The  author  of  this  review  was  well  understood  to  be  William 
H.  Prescott,  Esq.,  and  Mr.  Grahame  thus  remarks  upon  it  in 
his  journal  :  —  "  Prescott's  critical  notice  of  Bancroft's  third 
volume,  in  the  North  American  Review,  contains  some  hand 
some  commendation  of  my  work  ;  —  qualified  by  that  favorite 
canon  of  American  literary  jurisprudence,  that  no  man  not 
born  and  bred  in  America  can  perform,  as  such  a  function  ought 
to  be  performed,  the  task  of  describing  the  people,  or  relating 
even  their  distant  history.  Now,  I  am  inclined  to  suspect  that 
this  theorem  is  unsound  in  principle  and  false  in  fact.  1  think 
a  man  may  better  describe  objects,  from  not  having  been  in- 
veterately  habituated  and  familiarized  to"  them  ;  and  at  once 
more  calmly  contemplate  and  more  impartially  estimate  national 
character,  of  which  he  is  not  a  full,  necessitated,  born  partaker, 
—  and  national  habits,  prejudices,  usages,  and  peculiarities, 
under  the  dominance  of  which  his  own  spirit  has  not  been 
moulded,  from  its  earliest  dawn  of  intelligent  perception." 

In  a  letter  to  Mr.  Prescott,  dated  March  3d,  1841,  he  recurs 
to  this  topic.  "  On  the  general  censure  of  your  countrymen, 
that,  '  personally  unacquainted  with  America,  I  cannot  cor- 

VOL.  i.  / 


Xlii  MEMOIR. 

rectly  delineate  even  her  distant  history,'  —  Queen  Elizabeth 
desired  that  her  portrait  should  be  painted  without  shade  ;  be 
cause,  by  a  truly  royal  road  to  the  principles  of  that  art,  she 
had  discovered  that  shade  is  an  accident.  Are  not  some  of 
your  countrymen  possessed  of  a  similar  feeling,  and  desirous 
that  every  historic  portrait  of  America  should  represent  it  as 
it  ought  to  6e,  and  not  a*  it  is  ?  When  I  look  into  the 
works  of  some  of  your  greatest  American  writers,  and  see  how 
daintily  they  handle  certain  topics,  —  elusively  playing  or  rather 
fencing  with  them,  as  if  they  were  burning  ploughshares,  —  I 
must  respectfully  doubt,  if,  as  yet  at  least,  an  American  is  likely 
to  be  the  best  writer  of  American  history.  That  the  greatest 
and  most  useful  historian  that  has  ever  instructed  mankind  will 
yet  arise  in  America,  I  fondly  hope,  desire,  and  believe.  It 
would  be  my  pride  to  be  regarded  as  the  pioneer  of  such  a 
writer,  and  to  have,  in  any  wise,  contributed  to  the  utility  of 
his  work  and  the  extension  of  American  fame.  I  trust  it  is 
with  you,  as  it  is  with  me,  a  sacred  maxim,  that  to  good  his 
toriography  elevation  and  rectitude  of  soul  are  at  least  as  requi 
site  as  literary  resource  and  intellectual  range  and  vigor." 

In  June  of  this  year,  he  received,  and  in  his  journal  thus 
comments  on,  Quincy's  History  of  Harvard  University  :  — 
"  Read  it  with  much  interest.  No  other  country,  from  the 
first  syllable  of  recorded  time,  ever  produced  a  seat  of  learning 
so  honorable  to  its  founders  and  early  supporters  as  Harvard 
University.  This  work  is  the  only  recent  American  composi 
tion  with  which  I  am  acquainted  that  justifies  his  countrymen's 
plea,  that  there  is  something  in  their  history  that  none  but  an 
American  born  and  bred  can  adequately  conceive  and  render. 
His  account  of  the  transition  of  the  social  system  of  Massachu 
setts,  from  an  entire  and  punctilious  intertexture  of  church  and 
state,  to  the  restriction  of  municipal  government  to  civil  affairs 
and  occupations,  is  very  curious  and  interesting,  and  admirably 
fills  up  an  important  void  in  New  England  history.  He  wounds 

\  ».-.,*«•? 


MEMOIR.  xliii 

my  prejudices  by  attacking  the  Mathers,  and  other  persons  of 
a  primitive  cast  of  Puritanism,  with  a  severity  the  more  pain 
ful  to  me  that  I  see  not  well  how  I  can  demur  to  its  justice. 
But  though  I  disapprove  and  dissent  from  many  of  their  views, 
and  regret  many  of  their  proceedings,  yet  the  depths  of  my 
heart  are  with  the  primitive  Puritans  and  the  Scottish  Cove 
nanters  ;  and  even  their  errors  I  deem  of  nobler  kind  than  the 
frigid  merits  of  some  of  the  emendators  of  their  policy." 

In  the  same  strain  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Quincy  on  the  4th  of 
July  following,  —  "I  regard  the  primitive  Puritans  much  as  I 
do  the  Scottish  Covenanters  ;  respectfully  disapproving  and 
completely  dissenting  from  many  of  their  views  and  opinions  ; 
especially  their  favorite  scheme  of  an  intertexture  of  church  and 
state,  which  appears  to  me  not  only  unchristian,  but  aritichris- 
tian.  But  I  cordially  embrace  all  that  is  purely  doctrinal  in 
their  system,  and  regard  their  persons  with  a  fond,  jealous  love, 
which  makes  me  indulgent  even  to  their  errors.  Carrying  their 
heavenly  treasures  in  earthly  vessels,  they  could  not  fail  to  err. 
But  theirs  were  the  errors  of  noble  minds.  How  different  from 
those  of  knaves,  fools,  and  lukewarm  professors  !  I  forget 
what  poet  it  is  that  says, 

'  Some  failings  are  of  nobler  kind 
Than  virtues  of  a  narrow  mind.'  " 

The  complete  restoration  to  health  of  his  only  daughter,  and 
her  marriage  to  John  Stewart,  Esq.,  the  brother-in-law  of  the 
friend  of  his  youth  and  manhood,  Sir  John  F.  W.  Herschel, 
shed  bright  rays  of  happiness  over  the  last  years  of  Mr.  Gra- 
hame's  life.  These  were  passed  at  Nantes  in  his  domestic 
circle,  in  the  companionship  of  the  exemplary  and  estimable 
lady  who  had  united  her  fortunes  with  his,  and  cheered  by  the 
reflected  happiness  and  welfare  of  his  children.  His  only  son, 
who  was  pursuing  successfully  the  career  of  a  solicitor  in  Glas 
gow,  occasionally  visited  him  as  his  professional  avocations 
permitted.  His  daughter  and  son-in-law  divided  their  time 


xliv  MEMOIR. 

between  Nantes  and  England.  Always  passionately  fond  of 
children,  and  having  the  power  of  rendering  himself  singularly 
attractive  to  them  by  his  gentle,  quiet,  playful  manner,  he  was 
devotedly  attached  to  his  little  granddaughter,  who  became  his 
frequent  companion.  Under  the  influence  of  these  tranquil 
scenes  of  domestic  happiness  his  health  visibly  improved  ;  nor 
was  there  the  slightest  suspicion  of  the  organic  disease  which 
was  destined  soon  to  terminate  his  life.  By  direction  of  his 
medical  attendant,  Dr.  Foure,  an  eminent  physician  of  Nantes, 
he  abstained  from  all  severe  literary  toil  ;  yet  whatever  study 
was  permitted  to  him  was  directed  to  the  improvement  of  his 
History  of  the  United  States,  to  which  he  made  many  addi 
tions  and  amendments,  and  which  he  declared,  shortly  before 
his  death,  he  had  finally  completed  to  his  own  satisfaction,  and 
thoroughly  prepared  for  a  second  edition. 

Circumstances  in  which  Mr.  Grahame  had  been  accidentally 
placed  had  forcibly  directed  his  mind  to  the  subject  of  slavery, 
the  enormity  of  the  evil,  and  its  effects  on  the  morals  and  ad 
vancement  of  the  people  among  whom  it  existed.  He  had 
acquired,  in  right  of  his  first  wife,  an  estate  in  the  West  Indies, 
which  was  cultivated  by  slaves.  His  feelings  in  respect  of  this 
slave-derived  income  are  strongly  expressed  in  a  letter  to  Sir 
John  F.  W.  Herschel,  dated  the  24th  of  February,  1827. 
"  A  subject  has  for  some  time  been  giving  me  uneasiness.  My 
children  are  proprietors  of  a  ninth  share  of  a  West  India  estate, 
and  I  have  a  life-rent  in  it.  Were  my  children  of  age,  I  could 
not  make  one  of  the  negroes  free,  and  could  do  nothing  but  ap 
propriate  or  forego  the  share  of  produce  the  estate  yielded. 
Often  have  I  wished  it  were  in  my  power  to  make  the 
slaves  free,  and  thought  this  barren  wish  a  sufficient  tribute  to 
dujy.  My  conscience  was  quite  laid  asleep.  Like  many 
others,  I  did  not  do  what  I  could,  because  I  could  not  do  what 
I  wished.  For  years  past,  something  more  than  a  fifth  part  of 
my  income  has  been  derived  from  the  labor  of  slaves.  God 


MEMOIR. 


forgive  me  for  having  so  long  tainted  my  store  !  and  God  be 
thanked  for  that  warning  voice  that  has  roused  me  from  my 
lethargy,  and  taught  me  to  feel  that  my  hand  offended  rne  ! 
Never  more  shall  the  price  of  blood  enter  my  pocket,  or  help 
to  sustain  the  lives  or  augment  the  enjoyment  of  those  dear 
children.  They  sympathize  with  me  cordially.  Till  we  can 
legally  divest  ourselves  of  our  share,  every  shilling  of  the  pro 
duce  of  it  is  to  be  devoted  to  the  use  of  some  part  of  the 
unhappy  race  from  whose  suffering  it  is  derived."  Subse 
quently,  with  the  consent  of  his  children,  Mr.  Grahame  en 
tirely  gave  up  this  slave-property,  amounting  to  several  thou 
sand  pounds. 

His  interest  in  the  fate  of  the  African  race  had  been  excited 
several  years  before  by  a  circumstance  which  he  thus  relates  in 
his  diary,  under  date  of  October,  1821  :  —  "  My  father  is  most 
vigorously  engaged  in  protecting  three  poor,  forlorn  Africans 
from  being  carried,  against  their  wills,  back  to  the  West  Indies. 
They  were  part  of  the  crew  of  a  vessel  driven  by  stress  of 
weather  into  the  port  of  Dumbarton.  While  the  vessel  was 
undergoing  some  repairs,  the  people  of  the  town  remarked  with 
surprise  the  precautions  by  which  unnecessary  communication 
with  the  shore  was  prevented;  and  their  surprise  was  con 
verted  into  strong  suspicion,  when  they  perceived  sometimes, 
in  the  evening,  a  few  black  heads  on  the  deck,  suffered  to  be 
there  a  short  time,  and  then  sent  below.  A  number  of  the 
citizens  applied  to  the  magistrates,  but  the  magistrates  were 
afrajd  to  interfere  ;  so  the  people  had  the  sense  and  spirit  to 
convey  the  intelligence  by  express  to  my  father,  whose  zeal 
for  the  African  race  was  well  known.  He  instantly  caused 
the  vessel  to  be  arrested,  and  has  cheerfully  undertaken  the 
enormous  damages,  as  well  as  the  costs  of  suit,  to  which  he 
will  be  subjected,  if  the  case  be  decided  against  him."  In  a 
subsequent  entry  in  his  diary,  Mr.  Grahame  writes,  —  "But 
it  was  decided  in  his  favor." 


xlvi  MEMOIR. 

By  the  same  daily  record  it  appears,  that,  in  1823,  his  feel 
ings  were  still  further  excited  on  the  subject  of  slavery  by  an 
incident  which  he  thus  notices  : —  "  Zachary  Macaulay  showed 
me  to-day  some  of  the  laws  of  Jamaica,  and  pointed  out  how 
completely  every  provision  for  restraining  the  cruelty  of  the 
masters  and  alleviating  the  bondage  of  the  slaves  is  defeated 
by  counter  provisions  that  render  the  remedy  unattainable.  — 
What  a  stain  on  the  history  of  the  church  of  England  is  it, 
that  not  one  of  her  wealthy  ministers,  not  one  of  her  bishops 
who  sit  as  peers  of  the  realm  in  the  House  of  Lords,  has  ev 
er  attempted  to  mitigate  the  evils  of  negro  slavery,  or  ever 
called  the  public  attention  to  that  duty  !  No,  they  leave  the 
field  of  Christian  labor  to  Methodists  and  Moravians." 

Actuated  by  such  feelings  and  sentiments,  he  published,  in 
1823,  a  pamphlet,  entitled  "  Thoughts  on  the  Projected  Abo 
lition  of  Slavery,"  —  a  production,  which,  in  the  latter  years  of 
his  life,  he  declared  that  he  looked  back  upon  with  unalloyed 
pleasure  and  satisfaction.  In  1828,  Mr.  Grahame  relates  in  his 
journal,  that  he  had  had  a  long  conversation  on  this  subject  with 
the  celebrated  Abbe  Gregoire,  to  whom  he  had  been  intro 
duced  by  La  Fayette.  In  the  course  of  this  conversation,  the 
Abbe  stated  to  him  that  he  "  had  written  to  Jefferson,  combat 
ing  the  opinions  expressed  in  Jefferson's  '  Notes  on  Virginia,' 
of  the  inferiority  of  the  intellectual  capacity  of  the  negroes, 
and  that  Jefferson  had  answered,  acknowledging  his  error." 

The  prevalent  language  on  the  subject  of  negro  slavery  in 
some  parts  of  the  United  States,  and  the  apparently  general 
acquiescence  of  the  people  in  the  continuance  of  that  institu 
tion,  led  him,  in  the  latter  years  of  his  life,  to  apprehend,  that, 
in  the  first  edition  of  his  History,  he  had  treated  that  subject 
with  more  indulgence  than  was  consistent  with  truth  and  duty. 
Under  this  impression,  he  remarks  in  his  diary,  in  December, 
1837,  —  "  My  admiration  of  America,  my  attachment  to  her 
people,  and  my  interest  in  their  virtue,  their  happiness,  their 


MEMOIR. 

dignity,  and  renown,  have  increased,  instead  of  abating.  But 
research  and  reflection  have  obliged  me,  in  the  edition  of  my 
work  which  I  have  been  preparing  since  the  publication  in 
1835,  to  beat  down  some  American  pretensions  to  virtue  and 
apologies  for  wrong,  which  I  had  formerly  and  too  hastily  ad 
mitted.  Much  as  I  value  the  friendship  and  regard  of  the 
Americans,  I  would  rather  serve  than  gratify  them,  —  rather 
deserve  their  esteem  than  obtain  their  favor." 

Early  in  the  year  1842,  a  pamphlet,  published  in  London  in 
1835,  entitled  "  A  Letter  to  Lord  Brougham  on  the  Subject 
of  American  Slavery,  by  an  American,"  was  put  into  Mr.  Gra- 
hame's  hands,  as  he  states,  "  by  another  American,  most  hon 
orably  distinguished  in  the  walks  of  science  and  philanthropy," 
who  bid  him  "  read  there  the  defence  of  his  (the  American's) 
country."  The  positions  maintained  by  this  writer  —  that 
"  slavery  was  introduced  into  the  American  colonies,  now  the 
United  States,  by  the  British  government,"  and  that  "  the 
opposition  to  it  there  was  so  general,  that,  with  propriety,  it 
may  be  said  to  have  been  universal  "  —  roused  Mr.  Grahame's 
indignation  ;  which  was  excited  to  an  extreme  when  he  per 
ceived  these  statements  repeated  and  urged  in  a  memorial  ad 
dressed  to  Daniel  O'Connell  by  certain  Irish  emigrants  settled 
at  Pottsville,  in  the  United  States.  Having  devoted  some 
time  to  a  careful  perusal  of  this  pamphlet,  he  felt  himself  called 
upon  as  a  Briton,  from  a  regard  to  the  reputation  of  his 
country  and  to  truth,  and  from  a  belief  that  "  no  living  man 
knew  more  of  the  early  history  of  the  American  people  than 
himself,"  to  contradict,  in  the  most  direct  and  pointed  man 
ner,  the  statements  referred  to  ;  pledging  himself  "  to  prove 
that  the  abovementioned  pamphlet  was  a  production  more  dis 
graceful  to  American  literature  and  character  (in  so  far  as  it 
was  to  be  esteemed  the  representative  of  either)  than  any 
other  literary  performance  with  which  he  was  acquainted." 

He  accordingly   applied  himself   forthwith   to  an  extended 


xlviii  MEMOIR. 

discussion  of  this  subject  in  a  pamphlet  to  which  he  affixed 
the  title, — "Who  is  to  blame?  or  Cursory  Review  of 
American  Apology  for  American  Accession  to  Negro  Slav 
ery."  In  this  pamphlet  Mr.  Grahame  admits  that  Great 
Britain  "  facilitated  her  colonial  offspring  to  become  slave 
holders," —  that  "she  encouraged  her  merchants  in  tempt 
ing  them  to  acquire  slaves,"  —  that  "  her  conduct  during  her 
long  sanction  of  the  slave-trade  is  indefensible," — that  "she 
excelled  all  her  competitors  in  slave-stealing,  for  the  same  reason 
that  she  excelled  them  in  every  other  branch  of  what  was  then 
esteemed  legitimate  traffic  "  ;  —  but  denies  that  she  "forced  the 
Americans  to  become  slaveholders," —  denies  that  "  the  slave- 
trade  was  comprehended  within  the  scope  and  operation  of  the 
commercial  policy  of  the  British  government  until  the  reign  of 
Queen  Anne,"  —  and  asserts,  that,  "prior  to  that  reign, 
negro  slavery  was  established  in  every  one  of  the  American 
provinces  that  finally  revolted  from  Great  Britain,  except 
Georgia,  which  was  not  planted  until  1733."  The  argument 
in  this  pamphlet  is  pressed  with  great  strength  and  spirit, 
and  the  whole  is  written  under  the  influence  of  feelings  in  a 
state  of  indignant  excitement.  Without  palliating  the  conduct 
of  Great  Britain,  he  regards  the  attempt  to  exculpate  Ameri 
ca,  by  criminating  the  mother  country,  as  unworthy  and  un 
just  ;  contending  that  neither  was  under  any  peculiar  or  irre 
sistible  temptation,  but  only  such  as  is  common  to  man,  when, 
in  the  language  of  the  Apostle,  "  he  is  drawn  away  of  his  own 
lust  and  enticed."  His  argument  respecting  the  difference, 
in  point  of  criminality,  between  America  and  Great  Britain  re 
sults  as  another  identical  question  has  long  since  resulted  con 
cerning  the  comparative  guilt  of  the  receiver  and  the  thief. 

In  the  month  of  June,  1842,  at  the  urgent  request  of  his 
and  his  father's  friend,  Thomas  Clarkson,  the  early  and  suc 
cessful  asserter  of  the  rights  of  Africans,  he  repaired  to  Lon 
don,  for  the  purpose  of  superintending;  the  publication  of  this 

•  r      i  r  or 


MEMOIR. 

pamphlet.  On  arriving  there,  he  placed  his  manuscript  in  the 
hands  of  a  printer,  and  immediately  proceeded  to  Playford 
Hall,  Ipswich,  the  residence  of  Mr.  Clarkson.  Concerning 
this  distinguished  man,  Mr.  Grahame,  under  date  of  the  25th 
of  June,  thus  writes  in  his  diary  : —  "  Mr.  Clarkson's  appear 
ance  is  solemnly  tender  and  beautiful.  Exhausted  with  age 
and  malady,  he  is  yet  warmly  zealous,  humane,  and  affection 
ate.  Fifty-seven  years  of  generous  toil  have  not  relaxed  his 
zeal  in  the  African  cause.  He  watches  over  the  interests  of 
the  colored  race  in  every  quarter  of  the  world,  desiring  and 
promoting  their  moral  and  physical  welfare,  rejoicing  in  their 
improvement,  afflicted  in  all  their  afflictions.  The  glory  of 
God  and  the  interests  of  the  African  race  are  the  master- 
springs  of  his  spirit." 

After  two  days  passed  in  intercourse  with  this  congenial 
mind,  Mr.  Grahame  returned  to  London  and  occupied  him 
self  zealously  in  correcting  the  proof-sheets  of  his  pamphlet. 
On  the  morning  of  the  30th  of  June,  he  was  assailed  by 
severe  pain,  which  his  medical  attendant  attributed  at  first  to 
indigestion,  and  treated  as  such.  But  it  soon  assumed  a  more 
alarming  character.  Eminent  physicians  were  called  for  con 
sultation,  and  his  brother,  Thomas  Grahame,  was  sent  for. 
From  the  nature  and  intensity  of  his  suffering,  Mr.  Grahame 
soon  became  sensible  that  his  final  hour  was  approaching,  and 
addressed  himself  to  meet  it  with  calmness  and  resignation. 
He  proceeded  to  communicate  his  last  wishes  to  his  son-in- 
law,  directed  where  he  should  be  buried,  and  dictated  his 
epitaph  :  —  "  James  Grahame,  Advocate,  Edinburgh,  Author 
of  the  History  of  the  United  States  of  North  America  ;  aged 
51."  He,  at  the  same  time,  expressed  the  hope  concerning 
his  recently  published  pamphlet,  that  no  efforts  might  be 
spared  to  secure  its  sale  and  distribution,  "as  he  had  written 
it  conscientiously  and  with  single-heartedness,  and  had  in 
voked  the  blessing  of  God  upon  it." 

VOL.   I.  g 


I  MEMOIR. 

Notwithstanding  the  distinguished  skill  of  his  physicians, 
every  remedy  failed  of  producing  the  desired  effect.  His 
disorder  was  organic,  and  beyond  the  power  of  their  art. 
Such  was  the  excruciating  agony  which  preceded  his  death, 
that  his  friends  could  only  hope  that  his  release  might  not  he 
long  delayed.  This  wish  was  granted  on  Sunday  morning, 
the  3d  of  July. 

"  His  endurance  of  the  pain  and  oppression  of  breathing 
which  preceded  his  death,"  says  Mr.  Stewart,  "  was  perfect 
ly  wonderful.  His  features  were  constantly  calm,  placid,  and 
at  last  bore  a  bright,  even  a  cheerful  expression.  His  at 
tendants,  while  bending  close  towards  him,  caught  occasion 
ally  expressions  of  prayer  ;  his  profound  acquaintance  with 
the  Scriptures  enabling  him,  in  this  hour  of  his  need,  to  draw 
strength  and  support  from  that  inexhaustible  source,  where  he 
was  accustomed  to  seek  and  to  find  it." 

He  was  buried  in  Kensall  Green  Cemetery,  in  the  neigh 
bourhood  of  London.  His  son-in-law,  John  Stewart,  and 
his  brother,  Thomas  Grahame,  attended  his  remains  to  the 
grave.  His  son,  also,  who  had  set  out  from  Scotland  on 
hearing  of  his  illness,  though  arriving  too  late  to  see  him 
before  he  expired,  was  not  denied  the  melancholy  satisfaction 
of  being  present  at  his  interment.  A  plain  marble  monument 
has  been  erected  over  his  tomb,  bearing  the  exact  inscription 
he  himself  dictated. 

These  scanty  memorials  are  all  that  it  has  been  possible, 
in  this  country,  to  collect  in  relation  to  James  Grahame. 
Though  few  and  disconnected,  they  are  grateful  and  impres 
sive. 

The  habits  of  his  life  were  domestic,  and  in  the  family 
circle  the  harmony  and  loveliness  of  his  character  were  emi 
nently  conspicuous.  His  mind  was  grave,  pure,  elevated, 
far-reaching  ;  its  enlarged  views  ever  on  the  search  after  the 


MEMOIR.  Ji 

true,  the  useful,  and  the  good.  His  religious  sentiments, 
though  exalted  and  tinctured  with  enthusiasm,  were  always 
candid,  liberal,  and  tolerant.  In  politics  a  republican,  his 
love  of  liberty  was  nevertheless  qualified  by  a  love  of  order, 
—  his  desire  to  elevate  the  destinies  of  the  want/,  by  a  re 
spect  for  the  rights  and  interests  of  the  few.  As  in  his  re 
ligion  there  was  nothing  of  bigotry,  so  in  his  political  principles 
there  was  nothing  of  radicalism. 

As  a  historian,  there  were  combined  in  Mr.  Grahame 
all  the  qualities  which  inspire  confidence  and  sustain  it ;  —  a 
mind  powerful  and  cultivated,  patient  of  labor,  indefatigable 
in  research,  independent,  faithful,  and  fearless  ;  engaging  in  its 
subject  with  absorbing  interest,  and  in  the  development  of  it 
superior  to  all  influences  except  those  of  truth  and  duty. 

To  Americans,  in  all  future  times,  it  cannot  fail  to  be  an 
interesting  and  gratifying  circumstance,  that  the  foreigner,  who 
first  undertook  to  write  a  complete  history  of  their  republic 
from  the  earliest  period  of  the  colonial  settlements,  was  a 
Briton,  eminently  qualified  to  appreciate  the  merits  of  its 
founders,  and  at  once  so  able  and  so  willing  to  do  justice  to 
them.  The  people  of  the  United  States,  on  whose  national 
character  and  success  Mr.  Grahame  bestowed  his  affections 
and  hopes,  owe  to  his  memory  a  reciprocation  of  feeling 
and  interest.  As  the  chief  labor  of  his  life  was  devoted  to 
illustrate  the  wisdom  and  virtues  of  their  ancestors  and  to  do 
honor  to  the  institutions  they  established,  it  is  incumbent  on 
the  descendants  to  hold  and  perpetuate  in  grateful  remem 
brance  his  talents,  virtues,  and  services. 


ROBERT   GRAHAME,  ESQ., 

OF    WHITEHILL,    LANARKSHIRE,    SCOTLAND, 

THIS  WORK  IS  DEDICATED, 

WITH    SENTIMENTS    OF    PROFOUNDEST    REVERENCE    AND    AFFECTION, 

BY 

HIS  SON. 


>    .    *.,.•-'(..• 


PREFACE. 


THIS  historical  work  is  the  fruit  of  more  than  eleven  years 
of  eager  research,  intense  meditation,  industrious  composition, 
and  solicitous  revisal.  To  the  author,  the  scene  of  labor 
which  he  now  concludes  has  been  one  of  the  most  agreea 
ble  features  of  his  life.  And,  should  the  perusal  of  his  work 
afford  to  others  even  a  slight  share  of  the  entertainment  that 
its  production  has  yielded  to  himself,  he  may  claim  the  honor 
and  grati6cation  of  a  successful  contributor  to  the  stock  of 
human  happiness  and  intelligence. 

In  the  year  1827,  I  published  a  work  in  two  volumes, 
entitled  The  History  of  the  Rise  and  Progress  of  the  United 
States  of  North  America,  till  the  British  Revolution  in  1688. 
My  plan,  as  I  then  announced,  was,  and  it  still  is,  restricted 
to  the  history  of  those  provinces  of  North  America  (originat 
ing,  all  except  New  York  and  Delaware,  from  British  coloni 
zation),  which,  at  the  era  of  the  American  Revolution,  were 
included  in  the .  confederacy  of  The  United  States  ;  —  the 
illustration  of  the  parentage  and  birth  of  this  great  republic 
being  the  main  object  of  my  labors. 

The  first  and  second  volumes  of  the  present  work  may  be 
considered  as  a  republication  of  the  former  one.  They  em 
brace  the  rise  of  such  of  those  States,  comprehended  within 


Ivi  PREFACE. 

my  general  plan,  as  were  founded  prior  to  the  British  Revo 
lution  in  1688  ;  and  trace  their  progress  till  that  epoch,  and, 
in  several  instances,  till  a  period  somewhat  later.  Various 
additional  researches  which  I  have  made  since  my  first  his 
torical  publication,  and  in  which  I  have  been  assisted  by  sug 
gestions  communicated  to  me  from  America,  have  enabled 
me  to  correct  some  important  errors  by  which  that  work  was 
deformed,  and  now  to  reproduce  it  in  an  enlarged  and  greatly 
amended,  condition.  Of  some  of  these  emendations  the  nature 
and  effect  are  such  as  to  render  it  impossible  (without  making 
one  volume  contradict  the  statements  in  another)  to  publish 
a  continuation  of  the  History,  except  in  connection  with  the 
present  republication  of  the  first  portion  of  it,  —  a  circum 
stance  which  will  perhaps  expose  me  to  blame,  and  which  I 
most  sincerely  regret.  The  respect  which  I  feel  for  the 
judgment  of  some  intelligent  and  estimable  friends  (and  in 
particular  of  my  brother1)  has  induced  me  to  cancel  various 
passages  in  the  original  publication,  which  were  censured  as 
obtruding  superfluous  (perhaps  irrelevant)  reflections,  or  ac 
cumulating  an  excess  of  detail  and  illustration.  A  diligent 
and  laborious  revision,  frequently  repeated,  has  been  produc 
tive  of  numerous  alterations,  and,  I  hope,  proportional  im 
provement,  in  the  style  of  my  performance. 

The  third  and  fourth  volumes  of  the  present  work  form  the 
second  composition  which  was  prospectively  announced  in  the 
preface  to  my  first  historical  publication.  They  continue  the 
history  (commenced  in  the  first  two  volumes)  of  the  older 
American  States,  and  also  embrace  the  rise  and  progress  of 
those  younger  colonial  commonwealths  which  were  subse 
quently  founded,  —  till  the  revolt  of  the  United  Provinces 
from  the  dominion  of  Britain,  and  their  assumption  of  national 
independence.  Strictly  speaking,  they  form  a  continuation, 

1  Author'of  A  Treatise  on  Internal  Intercourse  and  Communication  in  Civ 
ilized  States,  and  other  scientific  works. 


PREFACE.  Ivii 

not  of  ray  original  publication,  but  of  my  original  work  as  it 
has  been  subsequently  altered  and  amended. 

In  the  preface  to  my  first  publication,  I  announced  a  third 
historic  composition,  which  was  intended  to  embrace  the  Rev 
olutionary  War,  and  the  establishment  and  consolidation  of  the 
North  American  republic.  But  I  have  been  induced,  on  farther 
reflection,  to  abandon  the  purpose  I  had  entertained  of  this  ul 
terior  effort.  Since  my  first  publication,  I  have  met  with  and 
read  Botta's  History  of  the  War  of  American  Independence,  —  a 
work  of  so  much  merit,  and  so  well  suited,  I  think,  to  the  pres 
ent  era,  that  it  seems  to  me  to  render  any  other  composition  (at 
least,  any  other  European  composition)  on  the  same  subject,  at 
present,  superfluous.  Fifty  or  sixty  years  hence,  a  final  and 
more  compendious  delineation  of  the  scene  may  be  required. 

In  the  collection  of  materials  for  the  production  of  this 
work,  I  have  been  obliged  to  incur  a  degree  of  toil  and  ex 
pense,  which,  in  my  original  contemplation  of  the  task,  I  was 
far  from  anticipating.  Considering  the  connection  that  so  long 
subsisted  between  Great  Britain  and  the  American  States,  the 
information  concerning  the  early  condition  and  progress  of 
many  of  these  communities,  which  the  public  libraries  of  Brit 
ain  are  capable  of  supplying,  is,  or  at  least  till  very  lately  was, 
amazingly  scanty.  Many  valuable  works,  illustrative  of  the 
history  and  statistics  both  of  particular  States  and  of  the  whole 
North  American  commonwealth,  I  found  had  no  place  and 
were  entirely  unknown  in  the  British  libraries  ;  a  defect  the 
more  discreditable,  as  the  greater  part  of  these  works  might 
have  been  obtained  without  much  difficulty  in  London  or  from 
America. 

After  borrowing  all  the  materials  that  I  could  so  procure, 
and  purchasing  as  many  more  as  I  could  find  in  Britain  or 
obtain  from  America,  my  collection  proved  still  so  defective 
in  many  respects,  that,  in  the  hope  of  enlarging  it,  and  in 
compliance  with  the  advice  of  my  friend,  Sir  William  Ham- 

VOL.  i.  h 


PREFACE. 

ilton1  (of  whose  counsel  and  assistance  I  can  better  feel  the 
obligation  than  express  the  value),  I  undertook  a  journey,  in 
the  year  1825,  from  Edinburgh,  where  I  then  resided,  to 
Gottingen ;  and  in  the  library  of  this  place,  as  I  had  been 
taught  to  expect,  I  found  a  richer  treasury  of  North  American 
literature  than  any,  or  indeed  all,  of  the  libraries  of  Britain  could 
at  that  time  supply.  From  the  resources  of  the  Gottingen 
library,  and  the  liberality  with  which  its  administrators  have 
always  been  willing  to  render  it  subservient  to  the  purposes 
of  literary  inquiry,  I  derived  great  advantage  and  assistance. 
I  am  indebted,  also,  to  the  private  collections  of  various  indi 
viduals  in  England  and  France  for  the  perusal  of  some  very 
rare  and  not  less  valuable  and  interesting  works,  illustrative  of 
the  subject  of  my  labors.  To  particularize  all  the  persons 
who  have  thus  or  otherwise  assisted  my  exertions  and  en 
riched  my  stock  of  materials  would  weary  rather  than  interest 
the  reader,  —  whom  it  less  imports  to  know  what  opportuni 
ties  I  have  had  than  what  use  I  have  made  of  them.  Yet  I 
must  be  indulged  in  one  grateful,  perhaps  boastful,  allusion  to 
the  advantage  I  have  enjoyed  in  the  communications  which  I 
had  the  honor  of  receiving  from  that  illustrious  friend  of 
America  and  ornament  of  human  nature,  the  late  General  La 
Fayette. 

History  addresses  her  lessons  to  all  mankind  ;  but  when  she 
records  the  fortunes  of  an  existing  people,  it  is  to  them  that 
her  admonitions  are  especially  directed.  There  has  never 
been  a  people  on  whose  character  their  own  historical  recol 
lections  were  calculated  to  exercise  a  more  animating  or  salu 
tary  influence  than  the  nation  whose  early  history  I  have  un 
dertaken  to  relate. 

In  national  societies  established  as  the  United  States  of 
North  America  have  been,  history  does  not  begin  with  ob- 

1  Professor  of  Universal  History,  and  afterwards  of  Logic  and  Metaphysics, 
in  the  University  of  Edinburgh. 

£  .  *    •.*•_*? 


PREFACE.  llX 

scure  traditions  or  fabulous  legends.  The  origin  of  the 
nation,  and  the  rise  and  progress  of  all  its  institutions,  may 
be  distinctly  ascertained  ;  and  the  people  enabled  to  acquire 
a  complete  and  accurate  conception  of  the  character  of  their 
earliest  national  ancestors,  as  well  as  of  every  succeeding 
generation  through  which  the  inheritance  of  the  national  name 
and  fortunes  has  devolved  on  themselves.  When  the  in 
teresting  knowledge  thus  unfolded  to  them  reveals,  among 
other  disclosures,  that  their  existence  as  a  nation  originated  in 
the  noblest  efforts  of  wisdom,  fortitude,  and  magnanimity,  and 
that  every  successive  acquisition  by  which  their  liberty  and 
happiness  have  been  extended  or  secured  has  proceeded  from 
the  exercise  of  the  same  qualities,  and  evinced  their  faithful 
preservation  and  unimpaired  efficacy,  —  respect  for  antiquity 
becomes  the  motive  and  pledge  of  virtue  ;  the  whole  body  of 
the  people  feels  itself  ennobled  by  the  consciousness  of  an 
cestors  whose  renown  will  constitute,  to  the  end  of  time,  the 
honor  or  reproach  of  their  successors  ;  and  the  love  of  vir 
tue  is  so  interwoven  with  patriotism  and  with  national  glory, 
as  to  prevent  the  one  from  becoming  a  selfish  principle,  and 
the  other  a  splendid  or  mischievous  illusion.1  If  an  inspired 
apostle  might  with  complacency  proclaim  himself  a  citizen  of 
no  mean  city,  a  North  American  may  feel  grateful  exultation 
in  styling  himself  the  native  of  no  ignoble  land,  —  but  of  a 
land  that  has  yielded  as  rich  a  harvest  of  glory  to  God  and 
of  happiness  to  man,  as  any  other  portion  of  the  world,  from 
the  earliest  lapse  of  recorded  time,  has  ever  had  the  honor  of 
affording.  Were  the  dark  and  horrible  blot  of  negro  slav 
ery  obliterated  from  this  scene,  the  brightness  of  its  aspect 

1  "  Certainly,  we  cannot  wish  to  see  perpetuated  among  us  the  old  Asiatic 
and  European  notions  of  indelible  hereditary  excellence.  But  surely  there 
is  a  point  at  which  good  feeling  and  sound  philosophy  can  meet,  and  agree  in 
ascribing  the  best  parts  of  our  character  to  the  moral  influence  of  a  virtuous 
and  intelligent  ancestry."  Verplanck's  Anniversary  Discourse  (1818)  before 
the  New  York  Historical  Society. 


Ix  PREFACE. 

would  awaken  universal  admiration,  and  shed  a  cheering  and 
ameliorating  ray  through  the  whole  expanse  of  human  nature 
and  society.  A  more  elevated  model  of  human  character 
could  hardly  be  proposed  to  the  imitation  of  the  American 
people  than  that  which  their  own  early  history,  and  the  later 
scene  of  their  achievement  of  national  independence,  be 
queath  to  them.  It  is  at  once  their  interest  and  their  honor 
to  preserve  with  sacred  care  a  bequest  so  richly  fraught  with 
the  instructions  of  wisdom  and  the  incitements  of  duty.  Ac 
quaintance  with  the  past  is  essential  to  a  wise  estimate  and 
use  of  the  present,  and  to  enlightened  consideration  of  the 
future.  The  diffusion  of  knowledge,  the  progress  of  popular 
liberty  and  improvement,  have  deprived  of  its  exclusive  and 
aristocratic  import  the  oft-repeated  maxim  of  other  days,  that 
History  is  the  lesson  of  kings.  The  American  people  will 
cherish  a  generous  and  profitable  self-respect,  while  they  com 
ply  with  the  canon  of  divine  wisdom,  to  "  remember  the  days 
of  old,  and  consider  the  years  of  many  generations  "  ;  and 
the  venerated  ashes  of  their  fathers  will  dispense  a  nobler 
influence  than  the  relics  of  the  prophet  of  Israel  in  reviving 
piety  and  invigorating  virtue.1 

The  most  important  requisite  of  historical  compositions, 
and  that  in  which,  I  suspect,  they  are  commonly  most  defec 
tive,  is  truth,2  —  a  requisite,  of  which  even  the  sincerity  of 
the  historian  is  insufficient  to  assure  us.  In  tracing  ascer 
tained  and  remarkable  facts,  either  backward  to  their  source, 

1  "  No  people  can  be  bound  to  acknowledge  and  adore  the  invisible  hand 
which  conducts  the  affairs  of  men  more  than  the  people  of  the  United  States. 
Every  step  by  which  they  have  advanced  to  the  character  of  an   independent 
nation  seems  to  have  been  distinguished  by  some  token  of  providential   agen 
cy."     Washington's  Speech  to  Congress,  30th  April,  1789. 

2  "  Truth  is  the  eye  of  History."     Polybius.     No  writer,  ancient  or  mod 
ern,  has  so  well  explained  and  inculcated  the  main  duties  of  a  historian  as 
Polybius  ;  and  few,  if  any,  have  better  exemplified   them.     He  is  one  of  the 
rare  exceptions  to  Dr.  Johnson's  maxim,  that  Every  historian  discovers  his 
country. 


PREFACE.  Ixi 

or  forward  in  their  operation,  the  historian  frequently  encoun 
ters,  on  either  hand,  a  perplexing  variety  of  separate  causes 
and  diverging  effects  ;  among  which  it  is  no  less  difficult  than 
important  to  discriminate  the  predominant  or  peculiar  springs 
of  action,  and  to  preserve  the  main  and  moral  stream  of  events. 
Indiscriminate  detail  would  produce  intolerable  fatigue  and  con 
fusion  ;  while  selection  necessarily  infers  the  risk  of  error.  The 
sacred  historians  often  record  events  with  little  or  no  refer 
ence  to  their  moral  origin  and  lineage  ;  and  have  thus  given  to 
some  parts  of  the  only  history  that  is  infallibly  authentic  an 
appearance  of  improbability,  which  the  more  reasoning  narra 
tives  of  uninspired  writers  have  exchanged,  at  least  as  fre 
quently,  for  substantial  misrepresentation.  It  may  be  thought 
an  imprudent  avowal,  and  yet  I  have  no  desire  to  conceal, 
that,  in  examining  and  comparing  historical  records,  I  have 
more  than  once  been  forcibly  reminded  of  Sir  Robert  Wai- 
pole's  assurance  to  his  son,  that  "  History  must  be  /a/se."1 
Happily,  this  apothegm  applies,  if  not  exclusively,  at  least 
most  forcibly,  to  that  which  Walpole  probably  regarded  as 
the  main  trunk  of  history,  but  which  (especially  in  modern 
times,  and  in  relation  to  free  and  civilized  communities)  is, 
indeed,  the  most  insignificant  branch  of  it,  —  the  intrigues 
of  cabinets,  the  secret  schemes  and  machinations  of  minis 
ters,  and  the  conflicts  of  selfish  and  trading  politicians. 

In  contemplating  scenes  of  human  dissension  and  strife,  it 

1  Horace  Walpole's  Works.  A  curious  illustration  of  historical  inaccuracy 
was  related  by  the  late  President  Jefferson  to  an  intelligent  English  traveller. 
The  Abbe  Raynal,  in  his  History  of  the  British  Settlements  in  America,  has 
recounted  a  remarkable  story  which  implies  the  existence  of  a  particular  law 
in  New  England.  Some  Americans,  being  in  company  with  the  Abbe  at  Paris, 
questioned  the  truth  of  the  story,  alleging  that  no  such  law  had  ever  existed 
in  New  England.  The  Abbe  maintained  the  authenticity  of  his  History,  till 
he  was  interrupted  by  Dr.  Franklin,  who  was  present,  and,  after  listening  for 
some  time  in  silence  to  the  dispute,  said,  "  I  can  account  for  all  this :  you  took 
the  anecdote  from  a  newspaper,  of  which  I  was  at  that  time  editor ;  and,  hap 
pening  to  be  very  short  of  news,  I  composed  and  inserted  the  whole  story." 
Hall's  Travels  in  Canada  and  the  United  States. 


IXU  PREFACE. 

is  difficult,  or  rather  it  is  impossible,  for  an  observer,  partaking 
the  infirmities  of  human  nature,  to  escape  entirely  the  contagion 
of  those  passions  which  the  controversies  arose  from  or  engen 
dered.  Thus  partialities  are  secretly  insinuated  into  the  mind  ; 
and,  in  balancing  opposite  testimony,  they  find  a  subtle  and  so 
much  the  surer  means  of  exerting  their  influence.  I  am  not 
desirous  of  concealing  that  I  regard  America  with  sentiments 
of  ardent,  perhaps  partial,  affection  ;  and,  in  surveying  various 
scenes  in  her  history,  I  derive  a  warm,  unreproved  pleasure 
from  the  conviction,  that,  in  dignity,  wisdom,  and  worth,  they 
transcend  the  highest  conception  suggested  by  the  annals  of 
any  other  people  in  ancient  or  in  modern  times.  If  my  con 
sciousness  of  the  existence  of  feelings  somewhat  partial  should 
not  exempt  my  judgment  from  their  influence,  I  hope  the  avow 
al,  at  least,  will  prevent  the  error  from  extending  to  my  read 
ers. 

I  am  far  from  thinking,  or  from  purposing  to  assert  or  in 
sinuate,  that  every  part  of  the  conduct  of  the  American 
States,  throughout  the  various  controversies  in  which  they 
have  been  involved,  was  pure  and  blameless.  Guile,  evil 
passion,  violence,  and  injustice  have  in  some  instances  dis 
honored  the  councils  and  transactions  of  the  leaders  and  as 
semblies  of  America;  and  it  was  the  conduct  of  one  of  the 
States,  the  most  renowned  for  piety  and  virtue,  that  suggested 
to  her  historian  the  melancholy  observation,  that,  "  in  all  ages 
and  countries,  communities  of  men  have  done  that,  of  which 
most  of  the  individuals  of  whom  they  consisted  would,  acting 
separately,  have  been  ashamed.  * 1  But  mingled  masses  are 
justly  denominated  from  the  elements  and  qualities  that  pre- 

1  Hutchinson's  History  of  Massachusetts.  This  observation  referred  imme 
diately  to  the  dispute  between  Massachusetts  and  the  confederated  States  of 
New  England  in  1649 ;  but  the  general  proposition  which  it  involves  is  one 
which  Hutchinson  (himself  an  ambitious  and  disappointed  antagonist  of  pop 
ular  assemblies)  snatches,  throughout  his  work,  every  occasion  to  propound 
and  illustrate. 


PREFACE.  Ixiii 

ponderate  in  their  composition  ;  and  sages  and  patriots  must 
be  regarded  as  the  mere  creations  of  fancy,  if  we  can  never 
recognize  the  lineaments  of  worth  and  wisdom  under  the  vest 
ure  of  human  imperfection.  There  exists  in  some  romantic, 
speculative  minds  a  Platonic  love  of  liberty,  as  well  as  vir 
tue,  that  consists  with  a  fastidious  disgust  for  every  visible 
and  actual  incarnation  of  either  of  these  principles  ;  and  which, 
when  not  corrected  by  sense  and  experience,  conducts  to  in 
genious  error  or  to  seemingly  generous  misanthropy. 

Whoever,  with  attention  minute  and  impartial,  examines  the 
histories  of  individuals  or  communities,  should  prepare  him 
self  to  be  disappointed  and  perplexed  by  numberless  imper 
fections  and  inconsistencies,  which,  wisely  pondered,  confirm 
the  Scriptural  testimony  of  the  inherent  frailty  of  human  na 
ture  and  the  reflected  lustre  of  human  virtue.  Much  error 
is  produced  and  prolonged  in  the  world  by  unwillingness  or 
inability  to  make  candid  concessions  or  to  admit  charitable 
interpretations,  —  to  acknowledge  in  an  adversary  the  excel 
lence  that  condemns  our  undiscriminating  hate,  —  in  a  friend 
or  hero,  the  defects  that  sully  the  pleasing  image  of  virtue, 
that  diminish  our  exultation,  and  rebuke  the  excesses  of  inor 
dinate  confidence.  There  is  not  a  more  common  nor  more 
unhappy  mistake  than  that  which  confounds  the  impulse  of 
sincerity  with  the  virtue  of  candor.  With  partial  views,  sin 
cerely  embraced,  but  not  candidly  appreciated,  we  encounter 
the  opposite  partialities  of  antagonists  ;  and,  by  mutual  com 
mission  and  perception  of  injustice,  confirm,  augment,  and 
reciprocate  each  other's  misapprehensions.  It  should  be  the 
principal  object  of  every  man,  who  undertakes  the  office  of  a 
historian,  to  correct,  as  far  as  he  may,  the  errors  by  which 
experience  is  thus  rendered  useless  ;  and  this  object  I  have 
purposed  and  endeavoured  to  keep  steadily  in  view. 

L'EPERONNIERE,    NEAR   NANTES, 

September,  1835. 


PREFACE. 

P.  S.  The  variations  which  distinguish  the  second  from 
the  first  edition  of  this  work  consist  of  the  retrenchment  of 
superfluities  in  some  quarters,  the  introduction  of  additional 
facts  and  remarks  in  others,  and  numerous  emendations  of 
the  style,  —  the  result  of  a  severe  revision,  in  which  I  have 
been  aided  by  the  taste  and  sagacity  of  some  accomplished 
friends,  and  especially  of  my  father-in-law,  the  Rev.  John 
Wilson,  President  of  the  Protestant  Consistory  of  Nantes  and 
La  Vendee.  To  the  kindness  of  those  distinguished  Ameri 
can  writers,  Robert  Walsh  and  Josiah  Quincy  (whose  friend 
ship  has  been  one  of  the  most  agreeable  fruits  of  my  labors), 
I  owe  my  recent  access  to  some  valuable  literary  materials  and 
my  acquaintance  with  some  curious  historic  details. 

It  may  be  proper  to  observe  (which  I  omitted  to  do  in 
the  preface  to  the  former  edition),  that,  in  the  course  of  this 
historical  digest,  I  have  frequently  illustrated  particular  por 
tions  of  my  narrative  by  citation  of  various  authorities  not  one 
of  which  accords  entirely  either  with  the  statements  of  the 
others  or  with  my  own.  To  explain,  in  every  such  instance, 
how  I  have  been  led,  from  comparison  of  conflicting  authorities, 
to  the  view  that  I  have  considerately  embraced,  would  encum 
ber  every  chapter  of  my  work  with  a  long  series  of  subsidiary 
disquisitions.  Much  of  the  labor  of  an  honest  historian  must 
either  be  painfully  shared  by  his  readers,  or  remain  wholly 
unknown  to  them. 

5  PLACE  DE  LAUNAY,  NANTES, 
June,  1842. 


CONTENTS 


THE    FIRST    VOLUME. 


BOOK    I. 


PLANTATION    AND    PROGRESS   OF   VIRGINIA,  TILL   THE 
BRITISH   REVOLUTION,   IN   1688. 

••>•-'•  '  -•  ,      fc*V!6'  >^;          .-.v-n^    -VrVV     ,>V  -  •.,--.;:«••••• 

CHAPTER  I. 


Cabot  despatched  by  Henry  the  Seventh  —  visits  the  Coast  of  North 
America.  —  Neglect  of  Cabot's  Discovery  by  Henry  —  and  by  his 
immediate  Successors.  —  Reign  of  Elizabeth  —  favorable  to  maritime 
Adventure.  —  Rise  of  the  Slave-trade.  —  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  —  projects 
a  Colony  in  North  America  —  first  Expedition  fails.  —  Elizabeth  names 
the  Country  Virginia.  —  Grenville  despatched  by  Raleigh  —  establishes 
a  Colony  at  Roanoke.  —  Misfortunes  of  the  Colonists  —  their  Return. 

—  Use  of  Tobacco  introduced  into  England.  —  Farther  Efforts  of  Ra 
leigh  —  terminate  unsuccessfully.  —  Accession  of  James  to  the  English 
Crown.  —  Gosnold's    Voyage  —  its    Effects.  —  James    divides   North 
America  between  two  Companies.  —  Tenor  of  their  Charters.  —  Royal 
Code  of  Laws.  —  The  first  Body  of  Colonists  embarked  by  the  London 
Company  —  arrive  in  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake  —  found  Jamestown.  — 
Dissensions  of  the  Colonists.  —  Hostility  of  the  Indians.  —  Distress  and 
Disorder  of  the  Colony.  —  Services  of  Captain  Smith  —  he  is  taken 
Prisoner  by  the  Indians  —  his  Liberation  —  he  preserves  the  Colony. 

—  The  Colonists  deceived  by  Appearances  of  Gold.  —  Smith  surveys 
the  Bay  of  Chesapeake  —  elected   President  of  the  Colony.  —  New 
Charter.  —  Lord  Delaware  appointed  Governor.  —  Newport,  Gates,  and 

VOL.    I.  i 


Ixvi  CONTENTS. 

Somers  sent  to  preside  till  Lord  Delaware's  Arrival  —  are  wrecked  on 
the  Coast  of  Bermudas.  —  Captain  Smith  returns  to  England. 


CHAPTER  II. 

The  Colony  a  Prey  to  Anarchy  —  and  Famine.  —  Gates  and  Somers  ar 
rive  from  Bermudas.  —  Abandonment  of  the  Colony  determined  upon  — 
prevented  by  the  Arrival  of  Lord  Delaware.  —  His  wise  Administration 

—  his  Return   to  England.  —  Sir  Thomas  Dale's  Administration.  — 
Martial  Law  established.  —  Indian  Chief's  Daughter  seized  by  Argal 

—  married  to  Rolfe.  —  Right  of  private  Property  in  Land  introduced 
into  the  Colony.  —  Expedition  of  Argal  against  Port  Royal  and  New 
York.  —  Tobacco  cultivated  by  the  Colonists.  —  First  Assembly  of 
Representatives  convened  in  Virginia.  —  New  Constitution  of  the  Col 
ony.  —  Introduction  of  Negro  Slavery.  —  Migration  of  young  Women 
from  England  to  Virginia.  —  Dispute  between  the  King  and  the  Col 
ony. —  Conspiracy  of  the  Indians.  —  Massacre  of  the  Colonists. — Dis 
sensions  of  the  London  Company.  —  The  Company  dissolved.  —  The 
King  assumes  the  Government  of  the  Colony — his  Death.  —  Charles 
the  First  pursues  his  Father's  arbitrary  Policy.  —  Tyrannical  Govern 
ment  of  Sir  John  Harvey.  —  Sir  William  Berkeley  appointed  Governor. 

—  The   provincial   Liberties  restored.  —  Virginia   espouses  the  royal 
Cause  —  subdued  by  the  Long  Parliament. —  Restraints  imposed  on  the 
Trade  of  the  Colony.  —  Revolt  of  the  Colony.  —  Sir  William  Berkeley 
resumes  the  Government.  —  Restoration  of  Charles  the  Second.  .    56 


CHAPTER  III. 

The  Navigation  Act  —  its  Impolicy.  —  Discontent  and  Distress  of  the 
Colonists.  —  Naturalization  of  Aliens.  —  Progress  of  the  provincial  Dis 
content.  —  Indian  Hostilities.  —  Bacon's  Rebellion.  —  Death  of  Bacon 

—  and  Restoration  of  Tranquillity. —  Bill  of  Attainder  passed  by  the 
colonial  Assembly.  —  Sir  William   Berkeley  superseded  by  Colonel 
Jeffreys.  —  Partiality  of  the  new  Governor  —  Dispute  with  the  Assem 
bly.  —  Renewal  of  Discontents.  —  Lord  Culpepper  appointed  Governor 

—  Severity  and  Rapacity  of  his  Administration.  —  An  Insurrection  — 
Punishment  of  the  Insurgents.  —  Arbitrary  Measures  of  the  Crown.  — 
James  the  Second  —  augments  the  Burdens  of  the  Colonists.  —  Corrupt 
and  oppressive  Government  of  Lord  Effingham.  —  Revolution  in  Britain. 

—  Complaints  of  the  Colonies  against  the  former  Governors  discouraged 
by  King  William.  —  Effect  of  the  English  Revolution  on  the  American 
Colonies.  —  State  of  Virginia  at  this  Period  —  Population  —  Laws  — 
Manners.          .        .         .      ~.  .»..*}«•  *••  5  .  105 


,i   ~>  \\f~f 


CONTENTS.  Ixvii 


BOOK    II. 

FOUNDATION    AND    PROGRESS    OF    THE   NEW    ENGLAND 
STATES,   TILL    THE   YEAR   1698. 

CHAPTER  I. 

Attempts  of  the  Plymouth  Company  to  colonize  the  northern  Coasts  of 
America.  —  Popham  establishes  a  Colony  at  Fort  Saint  George.  —  Suf 
ferings  and  Return  of  the  Colonists.  —  Captain  Smith's  Voyage  and 
Survey  of  the  Country  —  which  is  named  New  England.  —  His  ineffec 
tual  Attempt  to  conduct  a  Colony  thither.  —  The  Company  relinquish 
the  Design  of  colonizing  New  England.  — History  and  Character  of  the 
Puritans.  —  Rise  of  the  Brownists  or  Independents.  —  A  Congregation 
of  Independents  retire  to  Holland  —  they  resolve  to  settle  in  America 

—  their  Negotiation  with  King  James  —  they  arrive  in  Massachusetts 

—  and  found  New  Plymouth. — Hardships  —  and  Virtue  of  the  Colo 
nists.  —  Their  civil  Institutions. —  Community  of  Property.  —  Increase 
of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  Tyranny  in  England. —  Project  of  a  new  Col 
ony  in  Massachusetts. — Salem  built.  —  Charter  of  Massachusetts  Bay 
obtained  from  Charles  the  First  by  an  Association  of  Puritans.  —  Em 
barkation  of  the  Emigrants  —  Arrival  at  Salem.  —  Their  ecclesiastical 
Institutions.  —  Two  Persons  banished  from  the  Colony  for  Schism. — 
Intolerance  of  some  of  the  Puritans .  157 


CHAPTER  II. 

The  Charter  Government  transferred  from  England  to  Massachusetts.  — 
Numerous  Emigration.  —  Foundation  of  Boston.  —  Hardships  endured 
by  the  new  Settlers.  —  Disfranchisement  of  Dissenters  in  the  Colony. 

—  Influence  of  the  provincial  Clergy.  —  John  Cotton  and  his  Colleagues 
and  Successors.  —  Williams's  Schism  —  he  founds  Providence.  —  Rep 
resentative  Assembly  established  in  Massachusetts.  —  Arrival  of  Hugh 
Peters  —  and  Henry  Vane,  who  is  elected  Governor.  —  Foundation  of 
Connecticut — and  New  Haven.  —  War  with  the  Pequod  Indians. — 
Severities  exercised  by  the  victorious  Colonists.  —  Disturbances  created 
by  Mrs.  Hutchinson.  —  Colonization  of  Rhode  Island  —  and  of  New 
Hampshire  and  Maine.  —  Jealousy  and  fluctuating  Conduct  of  the  King. 

—  Measures  adopted  against  the  Liberties  of  Massachusetts  —  inter 
rupted  by  the  Civil  Wars.  —  State  of  New  England  —  Population  — 
Laws  —  Manners.  .  221 


kviii  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  III. 

New  England  embraces  the  Cause  of  the  Parliament.  —  Federal  Union 
between  the  New  England  States.  —  Provincial  Coinage  of  Money.  — 
Disputes  occasioned  by  the  Disfranchisement  of  Dissenters  in  Massa 
chusetts.  —  Impeachment  and  Trial  of  Governor  Winthrop.  —  Arbi 
trary  Proceedings  against  the  Dissenters.  —  Attempts  to  convert  and 
civilize  the  Indians.  —  Character  and  Labors  of  Eliot  and  Mayhew.  — 
Indian  Bible  printed  in  Massachusetts.  —  Effects  of  the  missionary  La 
bor.  —  A  Synod  of  the  New  England  Churches.  —  Dispute  between 
Massachusetts  and  the  Long  Parliament.  —  The  Colony  foils  the  Par 
liament —  and  is  favored  by  Cromwell.  —  The  Protector's  Administra 
tion  beneficial  to  New  England.  —  He  conquers  Acadia.  —  His  Propo 
sitions  to  the  Inhabitants  of  Massachusetts  —  declined  by  them.  —  Per 
secution  of  the  Anabaptists  in  Massachusetts.  —  Conduct  and  Sufferings 
of  the  Quakers.  —  The  Restoration.  —  Address  of  Massachusetts  to 
Charles  the  Second.  —  Alarm  of  the  Colonists  —  their  Declaration  of 
Rights.  —  The  King's  Message  to  Massachusetts  —  how  far  complied 
with.  —  Royal  Charter  of  Incorporation  to  Rhode  Island  and  Provi 
dence  —  and  to  Connecticut  and  New  Haven.  .  .  *  .r.'  . '. .  .  269 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Emigration  of  ejected  Ministers  to  New  England.  —  Royal  Commissioners 
sent  thither.  —  Petition  of  the  Assembly  of  Massachusetts  to  the  King 
—  rejected.  —  Policy  pursued  by  the  Commissioners. — Their  Disputes 
with  the  Government  of  Massachusetts  —  and  Return  to  England.  — 
Policy  of  the  Colonists  to  conciliate  the  King  —  Effects  of  it.  —  Cession 
of  Acadia  to  the  French.  —  Prosperous  State  of  New  England.  —  Con 
spiracy  of  the  Indians.  —  Philip's  War.  —  The  King  resumes  his  De 
signs  against  Massachusetts.  —  Controversy  respecting  the  Right  to 
Maine  and  New  Hampshire. —  Progress  of  the  Dispute  between  the 
King  and  the  Colony.  —  State  of  Parties  in  Massachusetts.  —  State  of 
Religion  and  Morals  in  New  England.  —  Surrender  of  the  Charter  of 
Massachusetts  demanded  by  the  King  —  refused  by  the  Colonists.  — 
Writ  of  Quo  Warranto  issued  against  the  Colony.  —  Firmness  of  the 
People.  —  Their  Charter  adjudged  to  be  forfeited 327 


CHAPTER  V. 

Designs—  and  Death  of  Charles  the  Second.—  Government  of  Massa 
chusetts  under  a  temporary  Commission  from  James  the  Second.  — 
Andros  appointed  Governor  of  New  England.  —  Submission  of  Rhode 
Island.  —  Effort  to  preserve  the  Charter  of  Connecticut.  —  Oppressive 
Government  of  Andros.  —  Colonial  Policy  of  the  King.  —  Sir  William 
Phips.  —  Indian  Hostilities  renewed  by  the  Intrigues  of  the  French.  — 


CONTENTS.  Ixix 

Insurrection  at  Boston.  —  Andros  deposed — and  the  ancient  Govern 
ment  restored.  —  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island  resume  their  Charters. 

—  William  and  Mary  proclaimed. —  War  with  the  French  and  Indians. 

—  Sir  William  Phips  conquers  Acadia.  —  Ineffectual  Expedition  against 
Quebec.  —  Impeachment  of  Andros  by  the  Colony  discouraged  by  the 
English  Ministers  —  and  dismissed.  —  The  King  refuses  to  restore  the 
ancient  Constitution  of  Massachusetts.  —  Tenor  of  the  new  Charter.  — 
Sir  William  Phips   Governor.  —  The   New  England   Witchcraft.  — 
Death  of  Phips.  —  War  with  the  French  and  Indians.  —  Loss  of  Aca 
dia. —  Peace  of  Ryswick.  —  Moral  and  Political  State  of  New  England.  371 


NOTES 447 


BOOK  I. 


PLANTATION  AND  PROGRESS 


VIRGINIA, 


TILL    THE 


BRITISH  REVOLUTION,  IN  1688. 


i  »*.  \  ;.>;};.  ^ 


THE 


HISTORY 


OF 


NORTH    AMERICA. 


BOOK    I. 

VIRGINIA. 

CHAPTER    I. 

Cabot  despatched  by  Henry  the  Seventh  —  visits  the  Coast  of  North  America. 

—  Neglect  of  Cabot's  Discovery  by  Henry — and  by  his  immediate  Succes 
sors.  —  Reign  of  Elizabeth  —  favorable  to  Maritime  Adventure.  —  Rise  of 
the    Slave-trade.  —  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  —  projects    a    Colony   in    North 
America  —  first  Expedition  fails.  —  Elizabeth  names  the  Country  Virginia. 

—  Grenville  despatched  by  Raleigh  —  establishes  a  Colony  at  Roanoke. — 
Misfortunes  of  the  Colonists  —  their  Return. — Use  of  Tobacco  introduced 
into  England.  —  Farther  Efforts  of  Raleigh  —  terminate   unsuccessfully.  — 
Accession  of  James  to  the  English  Crown.  —  Gosnold's  Voyage  —  its  Ef 
fects.  —  James  divides  North  America  between  two  Companies.  —  Tenor 
of  their  Charters.  —  Royal  Code  of  Laws.  —  The  first  Body  of  Colonists 
embarked  by  the  London  Company  —  arrive  in  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake  — 
found  Jamestown.  —  Dissensions   of  the  Colonists. — Hostility  of  the  In 
dians. —  Distress  and  Disorder  of  the  Colony.  —  Services  of  Captain  Smith 

—  he  is  taken  Prisoner  by  the  Indians  —  his  Liberation  —  he  preserves  the 
Colony.  —  The  Colonists  deceived  by  Appearances  of  Gold.  —  Smith  sur 
veys  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake  —  elected  President  of  the  Colony. —  New 
Charter.  —  Lord  Delaware   appointed   Governor.  —  Newport,   Gates,  and 
Somers  sent  to  preside  till  Lord  Delaware's  Arrival  —  are  wrecked  on  the 
Coast  of  Bermudas. —  Captain  Smith  returns  to  England. 

IT  was  on  the  third  of  August,  1492,  a  little  before  sunrise, 
that  Christopher  Columbus,  undertaking  the  grandest  enter 
prise  that  human  genius  has  ever  conceived,  or  human  talent 
and  fortitude  have  ever  accomplished,  set  sail  from  Spain  for 
the  discovery  of  the  western  world.  On  the  13th  of  October, 
about  two  hours  before  midnight,  a  light  in  the  island  of  San 
Salvador  was  descried  by  Columbus  from  the  deck  of  his 

VOL.    I.  1 


2  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

vessel,  .aad  Ar^erjcia  for  the  first  time  beheld  by  European 


eyes..1.  ,Of.  the  wide  train  of  important  consequences  that  de- 
p4njdeid  on'  this'  spectacle,  perhaps  not  even  the  penetrating  and 
comprehensive  mind  of  Columbus  was  adequately  sensible  ; 
but  to  the  end  of  time,  the  heart  of  every  human  being  who 
reads  the  story  will  confess  the  interest  of  that  eventful  mo 
ment,  and  partake  the  feelings  of  the  illustrious  man.  On  the 
following  day,  the  Spanish  adventurers,  preceded  by  their  com 
mander,  took  possession  of  the  soil  ;  the  external  emblems  of 
Christianity  were  planted  on  the  shores  of  the  western  hemi 
sphere  ;  and  a  connection,  pregnant  with  avast  and  various  proge 
ny  of  good  and  evil,  was  established  between  Europe  and  Ameri 
ca.  By  one  of  those  accidents  to  which  the  solidest  titles  to 
human  fame  are  exposed,  the  discoverer  of  the  new  world  was 
defrauded  of  the  honor  of  blending  his  own  name  with  the  great 
fruit  of  his  noble  adventure  ;  which  has  derived  its  now  unalter 
able  denomination  from  the  bold  imposture  by  which  an  earlier 
writer,  though  much  later  visitor  of  the  region,  Amerigo  Ves 
pucci,  of  Florence,  contrived  for  a  while  to  persuade  mankind 
that  he  was  the  first  European  to  whom  America  had  revealed 
her  existence.2 

1  Dr.  Robertson  espoused  the  opinion,  that  the  ancients  had  no  notion  of 
the  existence  of  the  western  world,  and  has  collected  from  ancient  writers 
many  proofs,  not  only  of  ignorance,  but  of  most  barbarous  error,  respecting  the 
extent  and  dimensions  of  the  earth.    Hist.  ofJlmerica,  Book  I.     Yet  a  Roman 
writer,  to  whose  sentiments  he    has  not  adverted,  is  supposed  by  some  to 
have  prophesied  the  discovery  of  America,  1400  years  before  this  event  took 
place.     The  passage  occurs  in  one  of  Seneca's  tragedies. 

"  Venient  annis 

Secula  seris,  quibus  oceanus 

Vincula  rerum  laxet,  et  ingens 

Pateat  tellus,  Tiphysque  novos 

Detegat  orbes  ;  nee  sit  terris 

Ultima  Thule."  Medea,  Act  II.  Chorus. 

This  passage  attracted  a  good  deal  of  comment  from  the  early  Spanish  and 
Flemish  writers  on  America.  Acosta  opposed  the  common  notion  of  its 
being  a  prophecy,  and  maintained  that  it  was  (as  most  probably  it  was) 
a  mere  conjecture  of  the  poet.  Natural  and  Moral  History  of  the  Indies,  B.  I. 
Certain  passages  in  Virgil's  JEneid,  in  Lucan's  Pharsalia,  and  even  in  the 
works  of  still  older  writers,  have  been  equally  cited,  with  more  zeal  and  in 
genuity  than  discretion  and  success,  as  containing  allusions  to  America.  See, 
on  this  subject,  that  portion  of  Basnage's  Histoire  des  Juifs  which  is  appended 
to  Stowe's  translation  of  Jahn's  History  of  the  Hebrew  Commonwealth. 

2  By  a  late  and  honorable  reparation  of  this  injustice,  at  the   period  when 
America  achieved  her  highest  glory  in  the  establishment  of  the  independence 
and  the  federal  constitution  of  the  United  States,  the  central  and  federal  Dis 
trict  received  the  name  of  Columbia. 

Joanna  Baillie's  Legend  of  Christopher  Columbus  is  the  grandest  poetical 
tribute  ever  rendered  to  the  discoverer  of  America. 


CHAP.  I.]  CABOT'S  ENTERPRISES.  3 

The  intelligence  of  the  successful  voyage  of  Columbus  was 
received  in  Europe  with  the  utmost  surprise  and  admiration.  In 
England,  more  especially,  it  was  calculated  to  produce  a  strong 
impression,  and  to  awaken  at  once  emulation  and  regret. 
While  Columbus  was  proposing  his  schemes  with  little  pros 
pect  of  success  at  the  court  of  Spain,  he  had  despatched  his 
brother  Bartholomew  to  the  court  of  Henry  the  Seventh  in 
England,  there  to  solicit  patronage  and  tender  the  fruits  of 
discovery.  Bartholomew  was  taken  prisoner  by  pirates,  and 
after  a  long  detention  was  reduced  to  such  poverty,  that,  on  his 
arrival  in  London,  he  was  compelled  by  the  labor  of  his  hands 
to  procure  the  means  of  arraying  himself  in  habiliments  be 
coming  his  interview  with  a  monarch.  His  propositions  were 
favorably  entertained  by  Henry  ;  but  before  a  definitive  arrange 
ment  was  concluded,  Bartholomew  "was  recalled  by  the  intelli 
gence,  that  his  brother's  plans  had  at  length  been  sanctioned 
and  espoused  by  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  of  Spain. 

If  the  wareful  and  penurious  disposition  of  Henry  contributed 
to  diminish  his  regrets  for  the  abandonment  of  a  hazardous  and 
expensive  undertaking,  the  astonishing  success  which  attended 
its  actual  prosecution  by  others  revived  the  former  projects 
of  his  mind,  and  inspired  a  degree  of  enterprise  that  showed 
him  both  instructed  and  provoked  by  the  better  fortune  of  the 
Spanish  crown.1  In  this  temper  he  hearkened  with  satisfac 
tion  to  the  proposals  of  one  Gabato  or  Cabot,  a  Venetian,  re 
siding  in  Bristol  ;  who,  from  reflection  on  the  discoveries  of 
Columbus  towards  the  southwest,  had  conceived  the  opinion, 
that  lands  might  likewise  be  discovered  towards  the  northwest, 
and  now  offered  to  the  king  to  conduct  an  expedition  in  this 
direction.  Henry,  prompted  by  his  avarice  and  stung  with 
envy  and  disappointment,  readily  closed  with  this  proposal,  and 
not  only  bestowed  on  its  author  a  commission  of  discovery, 
but,  on  two  subsequent  occasions,  issued  similar  commissions 
to  other  individuals  for  exploring  and  appropriating  the  territo 
rial  resources  of  unknown  portions  of  the  globe.3 

The  commission  to  Cabot,  the  only  one  which  was  produc 
tive  of  interesting  consequences,  was  granted  on  the  5th  of 

1  Bacon's  History  of  Henry  the  Seventh.  *  Bacon. 


4  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

March,  1495,  (about  two  years  after  the  return  of  Columbus 
from  America,)  and  empowered  that  adventurer  and  his  sons 
to  sail  under  the  flag  of  England  in  quest  of  countries  yet  unap 
propriated  by  Christian  sovereigns  ;  to  take  possession  of  them 
in  the  name  of  Henry,  and  plant  the  English  banner  on  the 
walls  of  their  castles  and  cities,  and  to  maintain  with  the  in 
habitants  a  traffic  exclusive  of  all  competitors  and  exempted 
from  customs  ;  under  the  condition  of  paying  a  fifth  part  of  the 
free  profit  of  every  voyage  to  the  crown.1  About  two  years 
after  the  date  of  his  commission,  Cabot,  with  his  second  son, 
Sebastian,  embarked  at  Bristol 2  in  a  ship  provided  by  the 
king,  and  attended  by  four  small  vessels  equipped  by  the 
merchants  of  that  city.  Sebastian  Cabot  appears  to  have 
greatly  excelled  his  father  in  genius  and  nautical  science  ;  and 
it  is  to  him  alone  that  historians  have  ascribed  all  the  discov 
eries  with  which  the  name  of  Cabot  is  associated. 

The  navigators  of  that  age  were  as  much  influenced  by  the 
opinions  as  incited  by  the  example  of  Columbus,  who  erro 
neously  supposed  that  the  islands  he  discovered  in  his  first 
voyage  were  outskirts  or  dependencies  of  India,  not  far  remote 
from  the  Indian  continent.  Impressed  with  the  same  notion, 
Sebastian  Cabot  conceived  the  hope,  that,  by  steering  to  the 
northwest,  he  might  fulfil  the  design  and  improve  the  per 
formance  of  Columbus,  and  reach  India  by  a  shorter  course 
than  the  great  navigator  himself  had  attempted.  Accordingly 
pursuing  that  track,  he  discovered  the  islands  of  Newfoundland 
and  St.  John  ;  and,  continuing  to  hold  a  westerly  course,  soon 
reached  the  continent  of  North  America,  and  sailed  along  it 
from  the  confines  of  Labrador  to  the  coast  of  Virginia.  Thus, 
conducted  by  Cabot,  whose  own  lights  were  derived  from  the 
genius  of  Columbus,  did  the  English  achieve  the  honor  of 
being  the  second  European  nation  that  visited  the  western 
world,  and  the  first  that  discovered  the  vast  continent  that 
stretches  from  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  towards  the  North  Pole  : 
for  it  was  not  till  the  succeeding  year  [1498]  that  Columbus, 
in  his  second  voyage,  was  enabled  to  complete  his  own  dis- 

1  Hakluyt.    Chalmers's  Annals  of  the  United  Colonies.    Hazard's  Historical 
Collections. 
8  Smith's  History  of  Virginia,  New  England,  and  the  Somcr  Isles. 


CHAP.  I.]  CABOT'S  DISCOVERIES.  5 

covery,  and  advance  beyond  the  islands  he  had  first  visited  to 
the  continent  of  America. 

Cabot,  disappointed  in  his  main  object  of  finding  a  western 
passage  to  India,  returned  to  England  to  relate  the  discoveries 
he  had  already  accomplished,  —  without  attempting,  either  by 
settlement  or  conquest,  to  gain  a  footing  on  the  American  con 
tinent.1  He  would  willingly  have  resumed  his  exploratory  en 
terprise  in  the  service  of  England,  but  he  found  that  in  his  ab 
sence  the  king's  ardor  for  territorial  discovery  had  greatly 
abated.  Seated  on  a  throne  which  he  acquired  by  conquest, 
in  a  country  exhausted  by  civil  wars,  —  involved  in  hostilities 
with  Scotland,  —  and  harassed  by  the  insurrections  of  his  sub 
jects  and  the  machinations  of  pretenders  to  his  crown,  —  Hen 
ry  had  little  leisure  for  the  execution  of  distant  projects  ;  and 
his  sordid  disposition  found  small  attraction  in  the  prospect  of 
a  colonial  settlement  which  was  not  likely  to  be  productive  of 
immediate  pecuniary  gain.  He  was  engaged,  likewise,  at 
this  time,  in  negotiating  the  marriage  of  his  son  with  the 
daughter  of  Ferdinand  of  Spain,  —  a  transaction  that  supplied 
additional  reasons  for  relinquishing  designs  which  could  not  fail 
to  give  umbrage  to  this  jealous  prince,  who  claimed  the  whole 
continent  of  America  in  virtue  of  a  donative  from  the  pope. 
Nor  were  the  subjects  of  Henry  in  a  condition  to  avail  them 
selves  of  the  ample  field  thrown  open  by  Cabot's  discov 
ery  to  their  enterprise  and  activity.  The  civil  wars  had 
dissipated  wealth,  repressed  commerce,  and  even  excluded  the 
English  people  from  partaking  the  general  improvement  of  the 
other  nations  of  Europe  ;  and  all  the  benefit,  which  for  the 
present  they  derived  from  the  voyage  of  Cabot,  was  that  right 
of  territorial  property  which  is  supposed  to  arise  from  priority 
of  discovery,  —  an  acquisition,  which,  from  the  extent  of  the 
region,  the  mildness  of  its  climate,  and  the  fertility  of  its  soil, 
afforded  an  inviting  prospect  of  advantageous  colonization. 
But  by  the  counteracting  circumstances  to  which  we  have 
already  adverted,  was  England  prevented  from  occupying  this 
important  field,  till  the  moral  and  religious  advancement  which 
her  people  were  soon  to  attain  should  qualify  her  to  become 

1  Churchill's  Collection  of  Voyages. 


6  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

the  parent  of  civility  and  population  in  North  America.  Cabot, 
finding  that  Henry  had  abandoned  all  colonial  projects,  soon 
after  transferred  his  own  services  to  the  Spaniards  ;  and  the 
English  seemed  contented  to  surrender  their  discoveries  and 
the  discoverer  to  the  superior  fortune  of  that  successful  people. 
The  only  immediate  fruit  of  his  enterprise  is  said  to  have 
been  the  importation  from  America  of  the  first  turkeys l  that 
were  ever  seen  in  Europe. 

It  is  remarkable,  that,  of  these  earliest  expeditions  to  the 
western  world  by  Spain  and  England,  not  one  was  either  pro 
jected  or  conducted  by  a  citizen  of  the  state  which  supplied 
the  subordinate  adventurers,  defrayed  the  expense  of  the  equip 
ment,  and  reaped  the  benefit  of  the  enterprise.  The  honor  of 
the  achievement  was  thus  more  widely  distributed.  The  Span 
ish  adventurers  were  conducted  by  Columbus,  a  native  of  Ge 
noa  ;  the  English,  by  John  Cabot,  a  citizen  of  Venice  ;2  and 
though  Sebastian  Cabot,  whose  superior  genius  assumed  the 
direction  of  the  enterprise,  was  born  in  England,  it  was  by  the 
experience  and  instructions  of  his  father  that  his  capacity  was 
trained  to  naval  affairs,  and  it  was  to  the  father  that  the  projec 
tion  of  the  voyage  was  due,  and  the  chief  command  of  it  in 
trusted.  Happily  for  the  honor  of  the  English  people,  the 
parallel  extends  no  farther  ;  and  the  treatment  which  the  two 
discoverers  experienced  from  the  nations  that  employed  them 
differed  as  widely  as  the  histories  of  the  two  empires  which 
they  respectively  contributed  to  found.  Columbus  was  loaded 
with  chains  in  the  region  which  he  had  the  glory  of  discovering, 
and  died,  the  victim  of  ingratitude  and  disappointment,  among 
the  people  whom  he  had  conducted  to  wealth  and  renown. 
Cabot,  after  spending  some  years  in  the  service  of  Spain,  also 
experienced  her  ingratitude  ;  and  returning  in  his  old  age  to 
England,  obtained  a  kind  and  honorable  reception  from  the 
nation  which  had  as  yet  derived  only  barren  hopes  and  a  seem 
ingly  relinquished  title  from  his  expedition.  He  received  the 

i  Why  this  bird  received  the  name  it  enjoys  in  England  has  never  been 
satisfactorily  explained.  By  the  French  it  was  called  coq  d'Inde,  on  account 
of  its  American  original ;  America  being  then  generally  termed  Western 
India. 

*  The  first  expedition  of  the  French  to  America  was  conducted,  in  like 
manner,  by  an  Italian,  John  Verazzan,  a  native  of  Florence. 


CHAP.  I.]        NEGLECT  OF  CABOT'S  DISCOVERIES.  7 

dignity  of  knighthood,  the  appointment  of  Grand  Pilot  of  Eng 
land,  and  a  pension  that  enabled  him  to  spend  his  declining 
years  in  circumstances  of  honor  and  comfort.1 

From  this  period  till  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  no  fixed  views 
were  entertained  nor  any  deliberate  purpose  evinced  in  Eng 
land  of  occupying  territory  or  establishing  colonies  in  America. 
In  the  earlier  part  of  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  the  atten 
tion  and  energy  of  the  English  government  were  absorbed  by 
wars  and  intrigues  on  the  continent  of  Europe  ;  and  the  inno 
vations  in  religious  doctrine  and  ecclesiastical  constitution,  that 
attended  its  close,  supplied  ample  employment  at  home  for  the 
minds  of  the  king  and  of  the  great  bulk  of  the  people.  It  was 
during  this  reign  that  (after  many  prelusive  gleams  supplied 
during  successive  ages  by  that  small  Christian  community 
which  never  admitted  the  sway  nor  adopted  the  errors  of  the 
church  of  Rome2)  the  full  light  of  the  Reformation  broke 
forth  in  Germany,  whence  it  was  rapidly  diffused  on  all  sides 
over  the  rest  of  Europe.  Henry,  at  first,  resolutely  opposed 
himself  to  the  adversaries  of  the  church  of  Rome,  and  even 
attempted  by  his  pen  to  stem  the  progress  of  the  innovations, 
—  a  service  which  the  pope  rewarded  by  conferring  on  him 
the  title  of  Defender  of  the  Faith.  But  his  subsequent  con 
troversy  with  the  papal  see  awakened  and  sanctioned  a  spirit 
of  inquiry  among  his  own  subjects,  which  spread  far  beyond 
his  expectations  and  desires,  and  eluded  all  his  attempts  to 
control  and  restrain  it.  A  discussion  of  the  pretensions  of  the 
church  of  Rome  naturally  begot  inquiry  into  her  doctrines  ; 
for  her  grand  pretension  to  infallibility  formed  the  only  authori 
ty  to  which  many  of  these  doctrines  were  indebted  for  their 
currency.  This  pretension,  indeed,  was  so  closely  interwoven 
with  the  whole  fabric  of  her  canons  and  institutions,  that  even 
a  partial  dissent  from  any  one  of  them  attacked  a  principle 
that  pervaded  them  all.  In  a  system  so  overgrown  with 
abuses,  the  spirit  of  inquiry,  wherever  it  gained  admission, 
could  not  fail  to  detect  error  ;  and  even  a  single  instance  of 
such  detection,  by  shaking  the  fundamental  tenet  of  infallibility, 
arraigned  the  solidity  of  the  whole  structure.  This  danger, 
which  could  not  have  been  entirely  evaded,  was  aggravated  by 

1  Smith.  2  Boat's  History  of  the  Moravian  Church. 


8  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

the  alarm  with  which  it  inspired  the  Roman  pontiffs,  and  the 
imprudence  of  the  defensive  policy  which  they  adopted.  Ut 
terly  proscribing  the  spirit  of  inquiry  which  it  was  no  longer  pos 
sible  to  suppress,  they  only  inflamed  its  vigor  and  hostility,  and 
compelled  the  Reformers  to  extend  their  views  from  an  emenda 
tion  of  the  actual  state  of  the  church  of  Rome  to  an  unqualified 
impugnation  of  her  authority  and  revolt  from  her  communion. 
The  progress  of  this  growing  spirit  of  inquiry  operated 
with  strong  and  salutary  influence  on  the  character  and  for 
tune  of  the  nations  in  which  it  prevailed.  A  subject  of  ra 
tional  investigation  had  at  length  been  found,  that  could  interest 
the  dullest  and  engross  the  most  vigorous  capacities  ;  the  con 
tagion  of  fervent  zeal  and  bold  excursive  thought  was  widely 
propagated  ;  and  every  people  by  which  the  reformed  doc 
trines  were  embraced  was  elevated  in  force  and  dignity  of  in 
tellectual  character.  Introduced  into  England  by  the  power 
of  a  haughty,  capricious,  and  barbarous  tyrant,  whose  object 
was,  not  the  emancipation  of  his  subjects,  but  the  deliverance 
of  himself  from  an  authority  which  he  wrested  from  the  pope 
only  to  wield  with  his  own  hands,  —  some  time  elapsed  before 
these  doctrines  worked  their. way  into  the  minds  of  the  people, 
and,  expelling  the  corruptions  and  adulterations  of  the  royal 
teacher,  attained  a  full  maturity  of  reasonable  influence.  Be 
sides  leavening  the  national  creed  with  the  spirit  of  the  ancient 
superstition,  Henry  encumbered  the  national  worship  with 
many  of  the  Romish  institutions  ;  retaining  whatever  was  cal 
culated  to  prove  a  useful  auxiliary  to  royal  prerogative,  or  to 
gratify  the  pomp  and  pride  of  his  own  sensual  imagination.  In 
the  composition  of  the  ecclesiastical  body,  he  preserved  the 
splendid  hierarchy  ;  and  in  the  solemnities  of  worship,  the 
gorgeous  ceremonial  of  the  church  of  Rome.  But  he  found  it 
easier  to  promulgate  ecclesiastical  ordinances,  than  to  confine 
the  stream  of  human  opinion,  or  stay  the  heavenly  shower  by 
which  it  was  gradually  reinforced  and  enlarged  ;  and  in  an 
after  age,  the  repugnance  that  manifested  itself  between  the 
constitution  of  the  English  church  and  the  religious  sentiments 
of  the  English  people  produced  consequences  of  very  great 
importance  in  the  history  of  England,  and  the  origination  of 
civilized  society  in  North  America. 


CHAP.  I.]      REVIVAL  OF   COMMERCIAL   ENTERPRISE.  9 

The  rupture  between  Henry  the  Eighth  and  the  Roman  see 
removed  whatever  obstacle  the  papal  donative  to  Spain  might 
have  opposed  to  the  appropriation  of  American  territory  by 
the  English  crown  ;  but  of  the  two  immediate  successors  of 
that  monarch,  the  one  neglected  this  advantage,  and  the  other 
renounced  it.  During  the  reign  of  Edward  the  Sixth,  the 
court  of  the  royal  minor  was  distracted  by  faction,  or  occupied 
with  the  conduct  and  the  vicissitudes  of  a  war  with  Scotland  ; 
and  the  attention  of  the  king,  and  of  a  great  portion  of  his 
people,  was  engrossed  by  the  care  of  extending  and  confirming 
the  establishment  of  the  Protestant  doctrines.  Introduced  by 
Henry  and  patronized  by  Edward,  these  doctrines  multiplied 
their  converts  with  a  facility  that  savored  somewhat  of  the  in 
fluence  of  human  authority  and  the  suggestions  of  secular  in 
terest  ;  till,  under  the  direction  of  Providence,  the  same  tem 
poral  power  that  had  been  employed  to  promote  the  introduc 
tion  of  truth  was  permitted  to  attempt  its  extinction.  The 
royal  authority,  which  Henry  had  blindly  made  subservient  to 
the  spread  and  recognition  of  the  Protestant  doctrines,  was 
now  employed  by  Mary,  with  equal  blindness,  as  an  instrument 
to  sift  and  purify  the  collective  mass  of  Protestant  professors, 
to  separate  the  genuine  from  the  spurious  portions  of  it,  and  to 
enable  the  sound  and  sincere  believers,  by  a  wonderful  display 
of  fortitude,  faithfulness,  and  patience,  to  illustrate  the  perfec 
tion  of  Christian  character  in  unison  with  the  purity  of  Chris 
tian  faith.  This  princess,  restoring  the  connection  between 
England  and  the  church  of  Romej  and  united  in  marriage  to 
Philip  of  Spain,  was  bound  by  double  ties  to  refrain  from  con 
testing  the  Spanish  claims  on  America.  It  was  not  till  the 
reign  of  Elizabeth,  that  the  obstacles  created  by  the  preten 
sions  of  Spain  were  finally  removed  ;  and  then,  indeed,  the 
prospect  of  collision  with  the  designs  of  this  state,  so  far  from 
appearing  objectionable,  presented  the  strongest  attraction  to 
the  minds  of  the  English. 

But  although,  during  this  long  period,  the  occupation  of 
America  was  entirely  neglected,  the  naval  resources  adapted 
to  the  formation  and  maintenance  of  colonies  were  diligently 
cultivated  in  England,  and  a  vigorous  impulse  was  communi 
cated  to  the  spirit  of  commercial  enterprise.  Under  the  direc- 

VOL.  i.  2 


10  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

tions  of  Cabot,  in  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Eighth,  the  English 
merchants  visited  the  coast  of  Brazil,  and  traded  with  the  co 
lonial  settlements  of  the  Portuguese.  In  the  reign  of  Edward 
the  Sixth,  the  fisheries  on  the  Banks  of  Newfoundland,  which 
had  been  previously  established,  were  extended  and  encour 
aged  ;  and  an  association  of  adventurers  for  the  discovery  of 
new  countries  was  incorporated  by  royal  charter.  Even  Mary 
contributed  to  promote  this  direction  of  the  national  dispo 
sition  and  faculties  :  she  founded  the  Corporation  of  Merchants 
trading  to  Russia,  and  studied  to  augment  the  security  of  their 
traffic  by  cultivating  a  friendly  relation  with  the  sovereign  of 
that  country.  During  her  reign,  an  attempt  highly  creditable 
to  English  enterprise  and  energy,  and  not  wholly  unsuccessful, 
was  made  to  reach  India  by  land ; l  and  a  commercial  inter 
course  was  established  with  the  coast  of  Africa.  Many  symp 
toms  conspired  to  indicate  with  what  adventurous  vigor  and 
persevering  ardor  the  English  might  be  expected  to  improve 
every  opportunity  of  exerting  and  enlarging  their  resources,  and 
how  high  a  rank  they  were  destined  to  hold  in  the  scale  of  na 
tions,  when  the  force  of  their  genius  should  be  thoroughly  de 
veloped  by  the  progress  of  their  recent  improvement,  and  when 
the  principles  and  policy  of  their  government  should  more  per 
fectly  coincide  with  the  temper  and  character  of  the  people. 

The  Spaniards,  meanwhile,  had  spread  their  settlements 
over  the  southern  regions  of  the  new  world,  and  achieved  an 
extent  of  conquest  and  accession  of  treasure  that  dazzled  the 
eyes  and  awakened  the  emulation  of  all  Europe.  Men  of  ac 
tive  and  enterprising  disposition  in  Spain,  curbed  and  restrict 
ed  at  home  by  the  illiberal  genius  of  their  municipal  govern 
ment,  eagerly  rushed  into  the  outlet  of  grand  adventure  pre 
sented  to  them  on  the  vast  theatre  of  Mexico  and  Peru.  The 
paganism  of  the  natives  of  these  regions  allured  the  invasion 
of  bigots  wedded  to  a  faith  that  recognized  compulsion  as  an 
instrument  of  conversion  ;  and  their  wealth  and  effeminacy  not 
less  powerfully  tempted  the  cupidity  and  ambition  of  men  in 
whom  pride  inflamed  the  thirst  of  riches,  while  it  inspired  con 
tempt  of  useful  industry.  Thus  every  prospect  that  could  ad 
dress  itself  prevailingly  to  human  desires,  or  to  the  peculiarities 

'  Hakluyt. 


CHAP.   I.]          SPANISH  CONQUESTS  IN  AMERICA.  H 

of  Spanish  taste  and  character,  contributed  to  promote  that 
series  of  rapid  and  vigorous  invasions  by  which  the  Spaniards 
overran  so  large  a  portion  of  the  continent  of  South  America. 
The  real  and  lasting  effect  of  their  acquisitions  has  correspond 
ed,  in  a  manner  very  satisfactory  to  the  moral  eye,  with  the 
character  and  merit  of  the  achievements  by  which  they  were 
earned.  The  history  of  the  expeditions  which  terminated  in 
the  conquest  of  Mexico  and  Peru  displays,  perhaps,  more 
strikingly  than  any  other  portion  of  the  records  of  the  human 
race,  what  amazing  exertions  the  spirit  of  man  can  prompt  him 
to  attempt,  and  sustain  him  to  endure,  —  how  signally  he  is 
capable  of  misdirecting  the  energy  with  which  his  Creator  has 
endowed  him,  and  of  disgracing  the  most  admirable  capacities 
of  his  nature,  by  rendering  them  instrumental  to  sordid,  unjust, 
and  barbarous  ends.  Religion,  the  grand  corrective  of  hu 
man  evil,  error,  and  woe,  shared  this  fatal  perversion  ;  and  the 
crosses,  which,  as  emblems  of  Christianity,  successively  an 
nounced  the  advent  of  this  faith  to  each  newly  discovered  re 
gion,  proved  far  other  than  the  harbingers  of  glory  to  God  or 
good-will  to  men.  The  deliberate  pride,  and  stern,  unsparing 
cruelty  of  the  Spanish  adventurers,  their  arrogant  disregard 
of  the  rights  of  human  nature,  and  calm  survey  of  the  desola 
tion  of  empires  and  destruction  of  happiness  and  life,  are  ren 
dered  the  more  striking  and  impressive  by  the  humility  of  their 
own  original  circumstances,  which  seemed  practically  to  level 
and  unite  them  by  habit  and  sympathy  with  the  mass  of  man 
kind.  Their  conquests  were  accomplished  with  such  rapidity, 
and  followed  with  such  barbarous  oppression,  that  a  very  few 
years  sufficed  not  only  to  subjugate  but  almost  wholly  to  extir 
pate  the  slothful  and  effeminate  idolaters  who  were  fated  to 
perish  by  their  hands.  Yet  the  fate  of  these  victims  of  Span 
ish  cruelty  was  not  unavenged.  To  their  conquerors,  and 
through  them  to  all  Europe,  they  communicated  the  most 
loathsome  and  horrible  disease  that  has  ever  afflicted  and  cor 
rupted  the  human  frame.  The  settlements  that  were  founded 
in  the  conquered  countries  produced,  from  the  nature  of  the 
soil,  a  vast  influx  of  gold  and  silver  into  Spain,  and  finally  ex 
ercised  a  pernicious  influence  on  the  liberty,  industry,  and 
prosperity  of  her  people.  But  it  was  long  before  the  bitter 


12  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

harvest  of  this  golden  shower  was  reaped  ;  and  in  an  age  so 
darkly  blind  to  the  liberal  truths  of  political  science,  it  could 
not  be  foreseen  through  the  dazzling  pomp  and  renown  with 
which  the  acquisition  of  so  much  empire  and  the  administration 
of  so  much  treasure  invested  the  Spanish  monarchy.  The 
exploits  of  the  original  adventurers,  embellished  by  the  ro 
mantic  genius  of  Spain,  and  softened  by  national  partiality,  had 
now  occupied  the  pens  of  Spanish  historians,  and  excited  a 
thirst  for  kindred  enterprise  and  hopes  of  similar  enrichment 
in  every  nation  to  which  the  tidings  were  conveyed.  The 
study  of  the  Spanish  language,  and  the  acquaintance  with  Span 
ish  literature,  which  the  marriage  of  Philip  and  Mary  introduced 
into  England,  contributed  to  cherish  this  impulse  in  the  minds 
of  the  English,  and  gave  to  the  rising  spirit  of  adventure 
among  them  a  strong  determination  towards  the  continent  of 
America. 

The  reign  of  Elizabeth  was  productive  of  the  first  attempts 
of  the  English  people  to  establish  a  permanent  settlement  in 
America.  But  many  causes  conspired  to  enfeeble  their  exer 
tions  for  this  purpose,  and  to  retard  the  accomplishment  of  so 
great  a  design.  The  civil  government  of  Elizabeth,  in  the 
commencement  of  her  reign,  was  acceptable  to  her  subjects  ; 
and  her  commercial  policy,  though  frequently  perverted  by  the 
interests  of  arbitrary  power  and  the  principles  of  a  narrow  and 
erroneous  system,  was  in  the  main,  perhaps,  not  less  laudably 
designed  than  judiciously  directed  to  the  cultivation  of  their 
resources  and  the  enlargement  of  their  prosperity.  By  per 
mitting  a  free  exportation  of  corn,  she  promoted  at  once  the 
agriculture  and  the  commerce  of  England  ;  and  by  treaties 
with  foreign  powers,  she  endeavoured  to  establish  commercial 
relations  between  their  territories  and  her  own.1  Sensible 

1  She  obtained  from  John  Basilides,  the  czar  of  Muscovy,  a  patent  which 
conferred  the  whole  trade  of  his  dominions  on  the  English.  With  this  grant, 
the  tyrant,  who  lived  in  continual  dread  of  a  revolt  of  his  subjects,  purchased 
from  Elizabeth  the  assurance  of  an  asylum  from  their  fury  in  England.  But 
his  son  Theodore  revoked  it,  and  answered  to  the  queen's  remonstrances,  that 
he  was  determined  to  rob  neither  his  own  subjects  nor  foreigners  by  subject 
ing  to  monopolies  what  should  be  free  to  all  mankind.  Camden.  So  supe 
rior  was  the  commercial  policy  which  natural  justice  taught  this  barbarian  to 
the  system  which  Elizabeth  derived  from  her  boasted  learning  and  renowned 
ability,  and  which,  in  the  progress  of  her  reign,  loaded  the  freedom  and  in 
dustry  of  her  people  with  patents,  monopolies,  and  exclusive  companies. 


CHAP.  I.]    MARITIME   ADVENTURE  UNDER  ELIZABETH.     13 

how  much  the  dignity  and  security  of  her  crown  and  the  wel 
fare  of  her  people  depended  on  a  naval  force,  she  studiously 
encouraged  navigation  ;  and  so  greatly  increased  the  shipping 
of  the  kingdom,  both  by  building  large  vessels  herself,  and  by 
promoting  ship-building  among  the  merchants,  that  she  was 
styled  by  her  subjects  the  Restorer  of  Naval  Glory  and  the 
Queen  of  the  Northern  Seas.1  Rigidly  just  in  discharging  the 
ancient  debts  of  the  crown,  as  well  as  in  fulfilling  all  her  own 
particular  engagements, — yet  forbearing  towards  her  people 
in  the  imposition  of  taxes  ;  frugal  in  the  expenditure  of  her  re 
sources,  and  yet  exerting  a  firm  and  deliberate  perseverance  in 
the  prosecution  of  well  directed  projects  ;  the  policy  of  her 
civil  government  at  once  conveyed  good  lessons  to  her  sub 
jects,  and  happily  coincided  with  the  general  cast  and  bent  of 
their  genius  and  disposition. 

During  a  reign  thus  favorable  to  commercial  enterprise,  the 
spirit  that  had  been  gradually  pervading  the  steady  minds 
of  the  English  was  called  forth  into  active  and  vigorous  exer 
tion.  Under  the  patronage  of  Dudley,  Earl  of  Warwick,  and 
conducted  by  Martin  Frobisher,  an  expedition  was  despatched 
for  the  discovery  of  a  northwest  passage  to  India  [1578]  : 
but  after  exploring  the  coasts  of  Labrador  and  Greenland, 
Frobisher  was  compelled  to  return  with  the  tidings  of  disap 
pointment.  If  the  ardor  of  the  English  was  damped  by  this 
failure,  it  was  speedily  reanimated  by  the  successful  effort  of 
Sir  Francis  Drake,  who,  with  a  feeble  squadron,  undertook 
and  accomplished  the  same  enterprise  that  for  sixty  years  had 
formed  the  peculiar  glory  of  the  Portuguese  navigator  Magel 
lan,  and  obtained  for  England  the  honor  of  being  the  second 
nation  that  completely  circumnavigated  the  globe.  A  general 
enthusiasm  was  produced  by  this  splendid  achievement,  and  a 
passion  for  naval  exploits  laid  hold  of  almost  all  the  leading 
spirits  of  the  age. 

Yet  still,  no  project  of  effecting  a  permanent  settlement 
abroad  had  been  entertained  or  attempted  by  the  English.  The 
social  happiness  enjoyed  by  the  subjects  of  Elizabeth  enhanced 
those  attractions  that  bind  the  hearts  of  men  to  their  native 

1  Camden.     Strype. 


14  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

land,  and  that  are  rarely  surmounted  but  by  the  experience 
of  intolerable  hardships  at  home,  or  the  prospect  of  sudden 
enrichment  abroad.  Now  the  territory  of  North  America  pre 
sented  none  of  the  allurements  that  had  incited  and  reward 
ed  the  Spanish  adventurers  ;  it  encouraged  no  hopes  but  of 
distant  gain,  and  invited  no  exertions  but  of  patient  industry. 
The  prevalence  of  the  Protestant  doctrines  in  England,  and  the 
increasing  influence  of  a  sense  of  religion  on  the  minds  of  the 
people,  disinclined  many  persons  to  abandon  the  only  country 
where  the  Reformation  appeared  to  be  securely  established  ; 
engrossed  the  minds  of  others  with  schemes  for  the  improve 
ment  of  the  constitution  and  ritual  of  their  national  church ; 
and  probably  repressed  in  some  ardent  spirits  the  epidemical 
thirst  of  adventure,  and  reconciled  them  to  that  moderate  com 
petency  which  the  state  of  society  in  England  rendered  easily 
attainable,  and  the  simplicity  of  manners  preserved  from  con 
tempt. 

But  if  the  immediate  influence  of  religious  principle  wras  un 
favorable  to  projects  of  colonization,  it  was  to  the  further  de 
velopment  of  that  noble  principle  that  England  was  soon  to 
be  indebted  for  the  most  remarkable  and  interesting  colonial 
establishment  that  she  has  ever  possessed.  The  ecclesiastical 
policy  of  Elizabeth  was  far  from  giving  the  same  general  satis 
faction  that  her  civil  government  afforded  to  her  subjects.  In 
heriting  the  arrogant  temper,  the  lofty  pretensions,  and  the 
taste  for  pompous  pageantry  by  which  her  father  had  been  dis 
tinguished,  without  partaking  his  earnest  zeal  and  sincere  bigot 
ry,  she  frequently  blended  religious  considerations  with  her  state 
policy,  but  suffered  religious  sentiments  to  exert  little,  if  any, 
influence  on  her  heart.  Like  him,  she  wished  to  render  the 
establishments  of  Christian  worship  subservient  to  the  indul 
gence  of  human  pomp  and  vanity,  and,  by  a  splendid  hierarchy 
and  gorgeous  ceremonial,  mediate  an  agreement  between  the 
loftiness  of  her  heart  and  the  humility  of  the  gospel.  But  the 
trials  and  afflictions  which  the  English  Protestants  underwent 
from  Mary  had  deepened  and  purified  the  religious  sentiments 
of  a  great  body  of  this  people,  and  at  the  same  time  associated 
with  many  of  the  ceremonies  retained  in  the  national  church 
the  idea  of  popery  and  the  recollection  of  persecution.  This 


CHAP.   I.]  RISE   OF  THE   SLAVE-TRADE.  15 

repugnance  between  the  sentiments  of  the  men  who  now  began 
to  be  termed  Puritans  and  the  ecclesiastical  policy  of  the  Eng 
lish  government  continued  to  increase  during  the  whole  of 
Elizabeth's  reign  :  but  as  the  influence  which  it  exercised  on 
the  colonization  of  America  was  not  manifested  till  the  suc 
ceeding  reign,  the  further  account  of  it  must  be  deferred  till  we 
come  to  trace  its  effects  in  the  rise  and  progress  of  the  settle 
ments  in  New  England. 

During  the  present  reign,  there  was  introduced  into  England 
a  branch  of  that  inhuman  traffic  in  negro  slaves  which  after 
wards  engrossed  so  large  a  share  of  her  commercial  wealth  and 
activity,  and  converted  a  numerous  body  of  her  merchants  into  a 
confederacy  of  robbers,  and  much  of  what  she  termed  her  trade 
into  a  system  of  the  basest  fraud  and  the  most  atrocious  rapine 
and  violence.  The  first  Englishman  who  exposed  himself  and 
his  country  to  this  foul  reproach  was  Sir  John  Hawkins,  who 
subsequently  attained  a  high  nautical  celebrity,  and  was  created 
an  admiral  and  treasurer  of  the  British  navy.  His  father,  an 
expert  English  seaman,  having  made  several  voyages  to  the 
coast  of  Guinea  and  from  thence  to  Brazil  and  the  West  In 
dies,  had  acquired  considerable  knowledge  of  these  countries, 
which  he  transmitted  to  his  son  in  the  copious  journals  he  pre 
served  of  his  travels  and  observations.  In  these  compositions, 
he  described  the  soil  of  America  and  the  West  Indies  as  en 
dowed  by  nature  with  extraordinary  richness  and  fertility,  yet 
languishing  in  total  unproductiveness  from  the  actual  want  of 
cultivators.  Europeans  were  represented  as  unequal  to  the 
toil  of  agriculture  in  so  sultry  a  climate  ;  but  the  natives  of 
Africa  as  peculiarly  well  adapted  to  this  employment.  Forci 
bly  struck  with  his  father's  remarks,  Hawkins  deduced  from 
them  the  project  of  transporting  Africans  into  the  western 
world  ;  and  having  composed  a  plan  for  the  execution  of  this 
design,  he  produced  it  to  some  persons  with  whom  he  was  ac 
quainted,  of  opulent  estate  and  enterprising  disposition,  and  so 
licited  their  approbation  and  concurrence.  A  subscription  was 
opened,  and  speedily  completed,  by  Sir  Lionel  Ducket,  Sir 
Thomas  Lodge,  Sir  William  Winter,  and  other  individuals, 
who  plainly  perceived  the  large  emolument  that  might  be  de 
rived  from  the  adventure  proposed  to  them.  By  their  assist- 


16  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ance,  Hawkins  was  enabled  to  set  sail  for  Africa  in  the  year 
1562  ;  and  having  reached  Sierra  Leone,  he  began  his  com 
merce  with  the  negroes.  While  he  trafficked  with  them  in  the 
usual  articles  of  barter,  he  took  occasion  to  give  them  an  in 
viting  description  of  the  country  to  which  he  was  bound  ;  con 
trasting  the  fertility  of  its  soil  and  the  wealth  of  its  inhabitants 
with  the  barrenness  of  Africa  and  the  poverty  of  the  African 
tribes.  Finding  that  the  unsuspecting  negroes  listened  to  him 
with  implicit  belief,  and  were  greatly  captivated  with  the  Eu 
ropean  luxuries  and  ornaments  which  he  displayed  to  their 
view,  —  he  offered,  if  any  of  them  were  willing  to  exchange 
their  destitute  circumstances  for  a  happier  condition,  to  trans 
port  them  to  this  more  bountiful  region,  where  he  assured  them 
of  a  friendly  reception,  and  an  ample  participation  in  the  enjoy 
ments  with  which  he  had  made  them  acquainted,  as  a  certain 
recompense  of  easy  labor.  The  negroes  were  ensnared  by 
his  flattering  promises  ;  and  three  hundred  of  them,  accepting 
his  offer,  consented  to  embark  along  with  him  for  Hispaniola. 
On  the  night  before  their  embarkation,  they  were  attacked  by 
a  hostile  tribe  ;  when  Hawkins,  hastening  with  his  crew  to 
their  assistance,  repulsed  the  assault,  and  carried  a  number  of 
the  assailants  as  prisoners  on  board  his  vessels.  The  next  day 
he  set  sail  with  his  mixed  lading  of  human  ware,  and  during  the 
passage  treated  the  negroes  who  voluntarily  accompanied  him 
with  more  kindness  and  indulgence  than  he  extended  to  his 
prisoners  of  war.  On  his  arrival  at  Hispaniola,  he  disposed 
of  the  whole  cargo  to  great  advantage,  and  endeavoured  to  in 
culcate  on  the  Spaniards  who  bought  the  negroes  the  same 
distinction  in  the  treatment  of  them  which  he  himself  had  ob 
served.  But,  having  now  put  the  fulfilment  of  his  promises 
out  of  his  own  power,  it  was  not  permitted  to  him  so  to  limit 
the  evil  consequences  of  his  perfidy  ;  and  the  Spaniards, 
who  had  purchased  all  the  Africans  at  the  same  rate,  consid 
ered  them  as  slaves  of  the  same  condition,  and  treated  them 
all  alike. 

When  Hawkins  returned  to  England  with  a  rich  freight  of 
pearls,  sugar,  and  ginger,  obtained  in  exchange  for  his  slaves, 
the  success  of  his  voyage  excited  universal  interest  and  curiosi 
ty  respecting  the  sources  from  which  so  much  wealth  had  been 


CHAP.  I.]  RISE  OF  THE  SLAVE-TRADE.  17 

derived.  At  first,  the  nation  was  shocked  with  the  barbarous 
aspect  of  a  traffic1  in  the  persons  of  men  ;  and  the  public  feel 
ing  having  penetrated  into  the  court,  the  queen  sent  for  Haw 
kins  to  inquire  in  what  manner  this  novel  and  extraordinary 
description  of  commerce  was  conducted  ;  declaring  to  him,  that, 
"  if  any  of  the  Africans  were  carried  away  without  their  own 
consent,  it  would  be  detestable,  and  call  down  the  vengeance 
of  Heaven  upon  the  undertakers."  Hawkins,  in  vindication 
of  himself,  protested  that  in  no  expedition  which  he  conducted 
should  any  of  the  people  of  Africa  (except  captives  obtained  in 
defensive  and  legitimate  war)  be  compulsorily  removed  from 
their  native  soil ;  and  he  declared,  that,  so  far  from  entertaining 
any  scruple  respecting  the  righteous  nature  of  his  traffic,  he 
deemed  it  an  act  of  humanity  to  carry  men  from  a  worse  con 
dition  to  a  better,  from  a  state  of  heathen  barbarism  to  an  op 
portunity  of  sharing  the  blessings  of  Christianity  and  civilization.1 
It  is  believed,  indeed,  and  seems  consonant  with  probability, 
that  Hawkins  did  not  himself  contemplate  the  perpetual  slavery 
of  the  negroes  whom  he  sold,  but  expected  that  they  would 
be  advanced  to  the  condition  of  free  servants,  whenever  their 
labor  had  produced  to  their  masters  an  equivalent  for  the  ex 
pense  of  their  purchase.  The  queen  was  satisfied  with  his  ex 
planation,  and  dismissed  him  with  the  assurance,  that,  while  he 
and  his  associates  acted  with  humanity,  they  might  depend  on 
her  countenance  and  protection. 

The  very  next  voyage  that  Hawkins  undertook  demon 
strated  still  more  clearly  than  the  former  the  deceitfulness  of 
that  unction  which  he  had  applied  to  his  conscience,  and  the 
futility  even  of  those  intentions  of  which  the  fulfilment  seemed 
to  depend  entirely  on  himself.  In  his  passage  he  met  with  an 
English  ship-of-war,  which  joined  itself  to  the  expedition  and 
accompanied  him  to  the  coast  of  Africa.  On  his  arrival,  he 
began  as  formerly  to  traffic  with  the  negroes,  and  endeavoured, 

1  This  was  the  plea  by  which  all  the  conductors  and  apologists  of  the 
slave-trade  attempted  to  vindicate  the  practice  in  its  infancy.  The  danger  of 
hearkening  to  a  policy  that  admits  of"  doing  evil  that  good  may  come  "  was 
never  more  strikingly  illustrated  than  by  the  descendants  of  those  men,  whom 
we  have  seen  (both  in  America  and  the  West  Indies)  enact  laws  prohibiting 
all  education,  moral,  political,  or  religious,  of  their  negro  slaves,  and  even  of 
emancipated  negroes. 

VOL.    I.  3 


18  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

by  reiteration  of  his  former  topics  of  persuasion,  to  induce 
them  to  embark  in  his  vessels.  But  they  now  treated  his  ad 
vances  with  a  reserve  that  betrayed  jealousy  of  his  designs. 
As  none  of  their  countrymen  had  returned  from  the  former 
voyage,  they  were  apprehensive  that  the  English  had  killed 
and  devoured  them  ;  a  supposition,  which,  however  offensive  to 
the  English,  did  greatly  and  erroneously  extenuate  the  inhu 
manity  of  which  they  were  actually  guilty.  The  crew  of  the 
ship-of-war,  observing  the  Africans  backward  and  suspicious, 
began  to  deride  the  gentle  and  dilatory  procedure  to  which 
Hawkins  confined  himself,  and  proposed  immediate  recourse 
to  the  summary  process  of  impressment.  The  sailors  belong 
ing  to  his  own  vessels  joined  with  the  crew  of  the  man-of-war, 
and,  applauding  their  suggestion,  made  instant  preparation  for 
carrying  it  into  effect.  Hawkins  protested  against  such  lawless 
barbarity,  and  vainly  endeavoured  to  prevail  on  them  to  desist 
from  their  purpose.  But  the  instructions  of  the  queen  and  the 
dictates  of  conscience  were  ineffectually  cited  to  men  whom  he 
had  initiated  in  piratical  injustice,  and  who  were  not  able  to 
discover  the  moral  superiority  of  courteous  treachery  over  un 
disguised  violence.  They  pursued  their  design,  and,  after  va 
rious  unsuccessful  attacks,  in  which  many  of  them  lost  their 
lives,  another  cargo  of  human  beings  was  at  last  forcibly  col 
lected.1  Such  was  the  origin  of  the  English  branch  of  the 
slave-trade,  which  is  here  related  the  more  minutely,  not  only 
on  account  of  the  remarkable  and  instructive  circumstances  that 
attended  the  commencement  of  the  practice,2  but  on  account 
of  the  influence  which  it  subsequently  exercised  on  the  colo 
nization  and  condition  of  some  of  the  provinces  of  North 
America. 

The  spirit  of  adventure  which  had  been  awakened  in  the 
English  nation  found  a  more  inviting  scene  of  exertion  in  the 
southern  than  in  the  northern  regions  of  America  ;  and  when, 
after  twenty  years  of  peace,  Elizabeth  was  engaged  in  war  with 
her  brother-in-law,  Philip,  the  prospect  of  enrichment  and  re 
nown  to  be  gathered  from  the  plunder  of  the  Spanish  colonies 

1  Hakluyt.     Hill's  Naval  History.     Hewit's  History  of  South   Carolina  and 
Georgia. 
*  See  Note  I.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 


CHAP.  I.]  SIR  WALTER   RALEIGH.  19 

opened  a  new  career,  which  was  eagerly  embraced  and  suc 
cessfully  prosecuted  by  numerous  bands  of  enterprising  men 
issuing  from  every  rank  of  society  in  England.  Accordingly, 
for  many  years,  the  most  popular  and  notable  exploits  of  the 
English  were  performed  in  the  predatory  hostilities  which  they 
waged  with  the  colonies  and  colonial  commerce  of  Spain. 
Even  in  scenes  so  unfavorable  to  the  production  or  display  of 
the  better  qualities  of  human  nature,  the  manly  character  and 
moral  superiority  of  the  English  were  frequently  and  strikingly 
disclosed.  Drake  and  other  adventurers  in  the  same  career 
were  men  equally  superior  to  avarice  and  fear  ;  and,  though  wil 
ling  to  encounter  hardship  and  danger  in  quest  of  wealth,  they 
did  not  esteem  it  valuable  enough  to  be  acquired  at  the  expense 
of  honor  and  humanity. 

And  yet  it  was  to  this  spirit,  so  unfavorable  to  industrious 
colonization,  and  so  strongly  attracted  to  a  more  congenial 
sphere  in  the  South,  that  North  America  was  indebted  for  the 
first  attempt  to  colonize  her  territory.  Thus  irregular  and  in 
calculable  (to  created  wisdom)  is  the  influence  of  human  pas 
sions  on  the  stream  of  human  affairs. 

The  most  illustrious  adventurer  in  England  was  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh,  a  man  endowed  with  brilliant  genius,  unbounded  am 
bition,  and  unconquerable  activity  ;  whose  capacious  mind, 
stimulated  by  an  ardent,  elastic,  and  versatile  spirit,  and  strong 
ly  impregnated  with  the  enthusiasm,  credulity,  and  sanguine 
expectation  peculiar  to  the  age,  no  single  project,  however 
vast  or  arduous,  could  wholly  absorb.  The  extent  of  his  ca 
pacity  combined  acquirements  that  are  commonly  esteemed  re 
mote  and  almost  incompatible  with  each  other.  Framed  in 
the  prodigality  of  nature,  he  was  at  once  the  most  industrious 
scholar  and  the  most  accomplished  courtier  of  his  age  ;  as  a 
projector,  profound,  ingenious,  and  indefatigable  ;  as  "a  soldier, 
prompt,  daring,  and  heroic  ;  so  contemplative  (says  an  old 
writer)  that  he  might  have  been  judged  unfit  for  action,  so  ac 
tive  that  he  seemed  to  have  no  leisure  for  contemplation.1 
The  chief  defect  of  his  mental  temperament  was  the  absence 

1  Lloyd's  State  Worthies.  Raleigh's  friend,  Edmund  Spenser,  the  poet, 
with  a  strange,  fantastic  mixture  of  images,  has  termed  him,  in  a  sonnet,  The 
Shepherd  of  the  Ocean. 


20  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

of  moderation  and  regulation  of  thought  and  aim.     Smit  with 
the  love  of  glorious   achievement,  he  had  unfortunately  em 
braced  the  maxim,  that  "  whatever  is  not  extraordinary  is  noth 
ing  ";  and  his  mind  (till  the  last  scene  of  his  life)  was  not  suf 
ficiently  pervaded  by  religion  to  recognize  that  nobility  of  pur 
pose,  which  ennobles  the  commonest  actions,  and  elevates  cir 
cumstances,  instead  of  borrowing  dignity  from  them.     Uncon 
trolled  by  steady  principle  and  sober  calculation,  the  fancy  and 
the  passions  of  Raleigh  transported  him,  in  some  instances, 
beyond  the  bounds  of  rectitude,  honor,  and  propriety  ;  and, 
seconded  by  the  malevolence  of  his  fortune,  entailed  reproach 
on  his  character   and  discomfiture  on  his  undertakings.     But 
though  adversity  might  cloud  his  path,  it  could  never  depress 
his  spirit  or  quench  a  single  ray  of  his  genius.     He  subscribed 
to  his  fortune  with  a  noble  grace,  and  by  the  universal  consent 
of  mankind  his  errors  and  infirmities  have  been  deemed  with 
in    the   protection  of  his  glory.     The  continual    discomfiture 
of  his  efforts  and  projects  served  only  to  display  the  exhaust- 
less   opulence   and  indestructible   vigor   of    that    intellect   of 
which  no  accumulation  of  disaster  nor  variety  of  discourage 
ment   could  either  repress   the  ardor   or  narrow   the   range. 
Amidst  disappointment  and  impoverishment,  pursued  by  royal 
hatred,  and  forsaken  by  his  popularity,  he  continued  to  project 
and  attempt  the  foundation   of  empires  ;  and  in  old  age  and  a 
prison  he  composed  the  History  of  the  World.     Perhaps  there 
never  was  another  instance  of  distinguished  reputation  as  much 
indebted  to  genius  and  as  little  to  success.     So  powerful,  in 
deed,  is  the   association  that  connects  merit  with  success,  and 
yet  so  strong  the  claim  of  Raleigh  to  elude  the  censure  which 
this  view  implies,  that  we  find  it  difficult  to  pronounce  him, 
even    amidst    uninterrupted   disaster,    an    unsuccessful    man. 
Whatever  judgment  may  be  formed  of  his  character,  it  must  be 
acknowledged  that  in  genius  he  was  worthy  of  the  honor,  which 
he  may,  perhaps,  be  considered  to  have  attained,  of  originating 
the  settlements  that  grew  up  into  the  North  American  common 
wealth. 

In  conjunction  with  a  kindred  spirit,  his  half-brother,  Sir 
Humphrey  Gilbert,  Raleigh  projected  the  establishment  of  a 
colony  in  that  quarter  of  America  which  Cabot  had  visited  ; 


CHAP.  I.]     PROJECT  OF  A  COLONY  UNDER  GILBERT.  21 

and  a  patent  for  this  purpose  was  procured  without  difficulty,  in 
favor  of  Gilbert,  from  Elizabeth.  [1578.]  This  patent  author 
ized  him  to  explore  and  appropriate  remote  and  barbarous  lands, 
unoccupied  by  Christian  powers,  and  to  hold  them  as  a  fief  of 
the  crown  of  England,  to  which  he  was  obliged  to  pay  the  fifth 
part  of  the  produce  of  their  gold  or  silver  mines  ;  it  permitted 
the  subjects  of  Elizabeth  to  accompany  the  expedition,1  and 
guarantied  to  them  a  continuance  of  the  enjoyment  of  the 
rights  of  free  denizens  of  England  ;  it  invested  Gilbert  with 
the  powers  of  civil  and  criminal  legislation  over  the  inhabitants 
of  the  territory  which  he  might  occupy,  — but  with  this  limita 
tion,  that  his  laws  should  be  framed  with  as  much  conformity 
as  possible  to  the  statutes  and  policy  of  England,  and  should 
not  derogate  from  the  supreme  allegiance  due  to  the  English 
crown.  The  endurance  of  the  patent,  in  so  far  as  related  to 
the  appropriation  of  territory,  was  limited  to  six  years  ;  and  all 
other  persons  were  prohibited  from  establishing  themselves 
within  two  hundred  leagues  of  any  spot  which  the  adventurers 
might  occupy  during  that  period.2 

The  arbitrary  power  thus  committed  to  the  leader  of  the 
expedition  did  not  prevent  the  accession  of  a  numerous  body 
of  subordinate  adventurers.  Gilbert  had  earned  high  and  hon 
orable  distinction  by  his  services,  both  in  France  and  Ireland  ; 
and  the  attractive  influence  of  his  reputation,  combining  with 
the  spirit  of  the  times,  and  aided  by  the  zeal  of  Raleigh  and 
the  authority  of  Secretary  Walsingham,  enabled  him  speedily 
to  collect  a  sufficient  body  of  associates,  and  to  accomplish  the 
equipment  of  the  first  expedition  of  British  emigrants  to  Amer 
ica.  But  in  the  composition  of  this  body  there  were  elements 
very  ill  fitted  to  establish  an  infant  commonwealth  on  a  solid  or 
respectable  basis  ;  the  officers  were  disunited,  the  crew  muti 
nous  and  licentious  ;  and,  happily  for  the  credit  of  England,  it 
was  not  the  will  of  Providence  that  the  adventurers  should  gain 

1  This  provision  was  necessary  to  evade  the  obstructions  of  the  existing 
law  of  England.  By  the  ancient  law,  as  declared  in  the  Great  Charter  of 
King  John,  all  men  might  go  freely  out  of  the  kingdom  ;  retaining,  indeed, 
their  allegiance  to  the  king.  But  no  such  clause  appears  in  the  charter  of  his 
successor ;  and  during  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  it  was  enacted,  that  any  subject, 
departing  the  realm  without  a  license  under  the  great  seal,  should  forfeit 
his  personal  estate  and  the  rent  of  his  landed  property.  13  Eliz.  cap.  3. 

s  Stith's  History  of  Virginia.     Hazard's  Historical  Collections. 


22  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

a  footing  in  any  new  region.  Gilbert,  approaching  the  Ameri 
can  continent  by  too  northerly  a  course,  was  dismayed  by  the 
inhospitable  aspect  of  the  coast  of  Cape  Breton  ;  his  largest 
vessel  was  shipwrecked  ;  and  two  voyages,  in  the  last  of  which 
he  himself  perished,  finally  terminated  in  the  defeat  of  the  en 
terprise  and  dispersion  of  the  adventurers.1  [1583.] 

But  the  ardor  of  Raleigh,  neither  daunted  by  difficulties 
nor  damped  by  miscarriage,  and  continually  refreshed  by  the 
suggestions  of  a  fertile  and  uncurbed  imagination,  was  inca 
pable  of  abandoning  a  project  that  had  gained  his  favor  and  ex 
ercised  his  energy.  Applying  to  the  queen,  in  whose  esteem 
he  then  held  a  distinguished  place,  he  easily  prevailed  with  her 
to  grant  him  a  patent  in  all  respects  similar  to  that  which  had 
been  previously  bestowed  upon  Gilbert.2  [1584.]  Not  less 
prompt  in  executing  than  intrepid  in  projecting  his  schemes, 
Raleigh  soon  despatched  two  small  vessels,  commanded  by 
Amadas  and  Barlow,  to  visit  the  districts  which  he  intended  to 
occupy,  and  to  examine  the  accommodations  of  their  coasts,  the 
productions  of  the  soil,  and  the  condition  of  the  inhabitants. 
These  officers,  avoiding  the  error  of  Gilbert  in  steering  too  far 
north,  shaped  their  course  by  the  Canaries,  and,  approaching 
the  North  American  continent  by  the  Gulf  of  Florida,  an 
chored  in  Roanoke  Bay,  off  the  coast  of  North  Carolina. 
Worthy  of  the  trust  reposed  in  them,  they  behaved  with  much 
courtesy  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  region,  whom  they  found 
living  in  all  the  rude  independence,  and  laborless,  but  hardy, 
simplicity,  of  savage  life,  and  of  whose  hospitality,  as  well  as  of 
the  mildness  of  the  climate  and  fertility  of  the  soil,  they  pub 
lished  a  flattering  encomium,  on  their  return  to  England.  This 
intelligence  diffused  general  satisfaction,  and  was  so  agreeable 
to  Elizabeth,  that,  in  exercise  of  the  parentage  she  proposed  to 
assume  over  the  country,  and  as  a  memorial  that  the  acquisition 
of  it  originated  with  a  virgin  queen,  she  thought  proper  to  be 
stow  on  it  the  name  of  Virginia.3 

A  prospect  so  encouraging  not  only  pricked  forward  the  en- 

1  Hakluyt,  III.  143.  *  Stith.     Hazard. 

3  Smith.  The  country  was  so  called  (says  Oldmixon)  either  in  honor  of  the 
virgin  estate  of  the  queen,  "  or,  as  the  Virginians  will  have,  because  it  still 
seemed  to  retain  the  virgin  purity  and  plenty  of  the  first  creation."  Old- 
mixon's  British  Empire  in  America,  2d  edit. 


CHAP.  I.]  COLONY   AT  ROANOKE.  23 

thusiastic  spirit  of  Raleigh,  but,  by  its  influence  on  the  minds 
of  his  countrymen,'  enabled  him  the  more  speedily  to  complete 
his  preparations  for  a  permanent  colonial  settlement  ;  and  he 
was  soon  in  a  condition  to  equip  and  despatch  a  squadron  of 
seven  ships  under  the  command  of  Sir  Richard  Grenville,  one 
of  the  most  heroic  spirits  of  the  time,  and  eminent  for  valor  in 
an  age  distinguished  by  the  numbers  of  the  brave.  But  this 
gallant  leader,  unfortunately,  was  more  infected  with  the  spirit 
of  predatory  enterprise,  at  that  time  so  prevalent  among  the 
English,  than  endued  with  the  qualities  which  his  peculiar  duty 
on  the  present  occasion  required  ;  and,  commencing  his  ex 
pedition  by  cruising  among  the  West  India  islands  and  cap 
turing  the  vessels  of  Spain,  he  initiated  his  followers  in  pursuits 
and  views  very  remote  from  peaceful  industry,  patient  perse 
verance,  and  moderation.  At  length  he  landed  a  hundred  and 
eight  men1  at  Roanoke  [August,  1585]  ;  and  left  them  there 
to  attempt,  as  they  best  might,  the  arduous  task  of  founding 
and  maintaining  a  social  establishment.  The  command  of  this 
feeble  band  was  committed  to  Captain  Lane,  assisted  by  some 
persons  of  note,  of  whom  the  most  eminent  were  Amadas, 
who  had  conducted  the  former  voyage,  and  Thomas  Heriot, 
the  improver  of  algebraical  calculation,  —  a  man  whose  generous 
worth  and  wisdom  might  have  preserved  the  colony,  if  these 
qualities  had  been  shared  by  his  associates,  and  whose  unremit- 
ted  endeavours  to  instruct  the  savages,  and  diligent  inquiries 
into  their  habits  and  character,  by  adding  to  the  stock  of  human 
knowledge,  and  extending  the  example  of  virtue,  rendered  the 
expedition  not  wholly  unproductive  of  benefit  to  mankind. 
The  selection  of  such  a  man  to  accompany  and  partake  the  en 
terprise  reflects  additional  honor  on  his  friend  and  patron,  Ra 
leigh.  On  their  first  arrival,  the  adventurers  were  regarded  with 
the  utmost  awe  and  veneration  by  the  savages,  who,  seeing  no 
women  among  them,  were  inclined  to  believe  them  not  born  of 
woman,  and  therefore  immortal.  Heriot  endeavoured  to  avail 
himself  of  the  admiration  they  expressed  for  the  guns,  the  clock, 
the  telescopes,  and  other  implements  that  attested  the  superior 
ity  of  their  visitors,  in  order  to  lead  their  minds  to  the  great 

1  Smith,  Book  I. 


24  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

Source  of  all  sense  and  science.  But  while  they  hearkened  to 
his  instructions,  they  accommodated  the  import  of  them  to  their 
own  depraved  notions  of  Divine  Nature  ;  they  acknowledged 
that  the  God  of  the  strangers  was  more  powerful  and  more 
beneficent  to  his  people  than  the  deities  whom  they  served, 
and  expressed  an  eager  desire  to  touch  and  embrace  the  Bible, 
and  apply  it  to  their  breasts  and  heads.1  In  the  hands  of  an 
artful  or  superstitious  priest,  such  practices  and  dispositions 
would  probably  have  produced  a  plentiful  crop  of  pretended 
miracles  and  imaginary  cures  of  diseases,  and  terminated  in  an 
exchange  of  superstition,  instead  of  a  renovation  of  moral  na 
ture.  But  Heriot  was  incapable  of  flattering  or  deceiving  the 
savages  by  encouraging  their  idolatry  and  merely  changing  its 
direction  ;  he  labored  to  convince  them  that  the  benefits  of  re 
ligion  were  to  be  obtained  by  acquaintance  with  the  contents 
of  the  Bible,  and  not  by  an  ignorant  veneration  of  the  exterior 
of  the  book.  By  these  labors,  which  were  too  soon  interrupt 
ed,  he  succeeded  in  making  such  impression  on  the  minds  of 
the  Indians,  that  Wingina,  their  king,  finding  himself  attacked 
by  a  dangerous  malady,  rejected  the  assistance  of  his  own 
priests,  and  solicited  the  attendance  and  prayers  of  the  English ; 
and  his  example  was  followed  by  many  of  his  subjects.2 

But,  unfortunately  for  the  stability  of  the  settlement,  the  ma 
jority  of  the  colonists  were  much  less  distinguished  by  piety  or 
prudence  than  by  eager  and  impetuous  desire  to  obtain  imme 
diate  wealth ;  their  first  pursuit  was  gold ;  and,  smitten  with 
the  persuasion  that  every  part  of  America  was  pervaded  by 
ramifications  of  the  mines  which  enriched  the  Spanish  colonies, 
their  chief  efforts  were  directed  to  the  acquisition  of  treasures 
that  happily  had  no  existence.  The  natives,  discovering  the 
object  which  the  strangers  sought  with  so  much  avidity,  amused 
them  with  tales  of  a  neighbouring  region  abounding  with  the 
precious  metals,  and  possessing  such  quantities  of  pearl,  that 
even  the  walls  of  the  houses  glittered  with  its  lavish  display.3 
Eagerly  listening  to  these  agreeable  fictions,  the  adventurers 
consumed  their  time  and  endured  extreme  hardships  in  pursuit 
of  a  phantom,  while  they  neglected  entirely  the  means  of  pro- 

1  Heriot,  apud  Smith.  *  Ibid.  3  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]  FAILURE  OF  THE   SETTLEMENT.  25 

viding  for  their  future  subsistence.  The  detection  of  the  im 
posture  produced  mutual  suspicion  and  disgust  between  them 
and  the  savages,  and  finally  led  to  open  enmity  and  acts  of 
bloodshed.  The  stock  of  victuals  brought  with  them  from 
England  was  exhausted  ;  the  additional  supplies  they  had  been 
taught  to  expect  did  not  arrive  ;  and  the  hostility  of  the  In 
dians  left  them  no  other  dependence  than  on  the  precarious  re 
sources  of  the  woods  and  rivers.  Thus,  struggling  with  in 
creasing  scarcity  of  food,  and  surrounded  by  enemies,  the 
colonists  were  reduced  to  a  state  of  the  utmost  distress  and 
danger,  when  a  prospect  of  deliverance  was  unexpectedly  pre 
sented  to  them  by  the  arrival  of  Sir  Francis  Drake -with  a  fleet 
which  he  was  conducting  home  from  a  successful  enterprise 
against  the  Spaniards  in  the  West  Indies.  Drake  consented 
to  supply  them  with  an  addition  to  their  numbers  and  a  liberal 
contribution  of  provisions  ;  and  if  this  had  been  done,  it  seems 
probable,  that,  with  the  ample  reinforcement  soon  after  trans 
mitted  by  Raleigh,  the  colonists  might  have  been  able  to  main 
tain  their  establishment  in  America.  But  Drake's  intentions 
were  frustrated  by  a  storm,  that  carried  out  to  sea  the  very 
ship  which  he  had  freighted  with  the  requisite  supplies  ;  and  as 
he  could  not  afford  to  weaken  his  fleet  by  a  further  contribution 
for  their  defence  or  subsistence,  the  adventurers,  now  complete 
ly  exhausted  and  discouraged,  unanimously  determined  to  aban 
don  the  settlement.  In  compliance  with  their  desire,  Drake  ac 
cordingly  received  them  on  board  his  vessels,  and  reconducted 
them  to  England.1  [1586.]  Such  was  the  abortive  issue  of 
the  first  colonial  settlement  planted  by  the  English  in  America. 
Of  the  political  consequences  that  resulted  from  this  expe 
dition,  the  catalogue,  though  far  from  copious,  is  not  devoid  of 
interest.  An  important  accession  was  made  to  the  scanty 
stock  of  knowledge  respecting  North  America  ;  the  spirit  of 
mining  adventure  received  a  salutary  check  ;  and  the  use  of  to 
bacco,  already  introduced  by  the  Spaniards  and  Portuguese 
into  other  parts  of  Europe,  was  now  imported  into  England. 
This  herb  the  Indians  esteemed  their  principal  medicine  ;2 
and  some  tribes  are  said  to  have  ascribed  its  virtues  to  the  in- 

1  Smith.  2  Heriot,  apud  Smith. 

VOL.    I.  4 


26  HISTORY   OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

habitation  of  one  of  those  spiritual  beings  which  they  supposed 
to  reside  in  all  the  extraordinary  productions  of  nature.  Lane 
and  his  associates,  contracting  a  relish  for  its  properties, 
brought  a  quantity  of  tobacco  with  them  to  England,  and 
taught  the  use  of  it  to  tHeir  countrymen.  Raleigh,  in  particu 
lar,  adopted,  and,  with  the  help  of  some  young  men  of  fashion, 
encouraged,  the  practice,  which  soon  established  itself,  and 
spread  with  a  vigor  that  outran  the  help  of  courtiers  and  de 
fied  the  hindrance  of  kings  ;  and,  awakening  a  new  and  almost 
universal  appetite  in  human  nature,  formed  an  important  source 
of  revenue  to  England,  and  multiplied  the  ties  that  united 
Europe  with  America.1 

But  the  disappointment  that  attended  this  enterprise  did  not 
terminate  with  the  return  of  Lane  and  his  followers  to  England. 
A  few  days  after  their  departure  from  Roanoke,  a  vessel,  de 
spatched  by  Raleigh,  reached  the  evacuated  settlement  with  a 
plentiful  contribution  of  all  necessary  stores  ;  and  only  a  fort 
night  after  this  bark  set  sail  to  return  from  its  bootless  voyage, 
a  still  larger  reinforcement  of  men  and  provisions  arrived  in 
three  ships,  equipped  by  Raleigh,  and  commanded  by  Sir 
Richard  Grenville.  Disconcerted  by  the  absence  of  the  ves 
sel  that  preceded  him,  and  unable  to  obtain  any  tidings  of 
the  colonists,  yet  unwilling  to  abandon  the  possession  of  the 
country,  Grenville  landed  fifty  men  at  Roanoke,  and,  leaving 
them  in  possession  of  an  ample  supply  of  provisions,  returned 
to  England  to  communicate  the  state  of  affairs  and  obtain  fur 
ther  directions.2 

These  successive  defeats  and  mishaps  excited  much  gloomy 
speculation  and  superstitious  surmise  in  England,3  but  could 
neither  vanquish  the  hopes  nor  exhaust  the  resources  of  Raleigh, 

1  Queen  Elizabeth  herself,  in  the  close  of  her  life,  became  one  of  Raleigh's 
pupils  in  the  accomplishment  of  smoking.  One  day,  as  she  was  partaking 
this  indulgence,  Raleigh  betted  with  her  that  he  could  ascertain  the  weight 
of  the  smoke  that  should  issue  in  a  given  time  from  her  Majesty's  mouth. 
For  this  purpose,  he  weighed  first  the  tobacco,  and  afterwards  the  ashes  left 
in  the  pipe,  and  assigned  the  difference  as  the  weight  of  the  smoke.  The 
queen  acknowledged  that  he  had  gained  his  bet ;  adding,  that  she  believed  he 
was  the  only  alchemist  who  had  ever  succeeded  in  turning  smoke  into  gold. 
—  Stith. 

*•  Smith.  "  The  Virginians  positively  affirm  that  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  made 
this  voyage  in  person."  Oldmixon's  British  Empire  in  America,  2d  edit.  But 
the  generous  wish  alone  seems  to  have  been  the  parent  of  this  notion. 

3  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]      FURTHER  ATTEMPTS  AT  COLONIZATION.         27 

whose  dauntless  and  aspiring  mind  still  rose  superior  to  all  mis 
chance.  In  the  following  year  [1587],  he  fitted  out  and  de 
spatched  three  ships  under  the  command  of  Captain  White, 
with  directions  to  join  the  small  body  that  Grenville  had  estab 
lished  at  Roanoke,  and  thence  to  transfer  the  settlement  to 
the  Bay  of  Chesapeake,  of  which  the  superior  advantages  were 
remarked  in  the  preceding  year  by  Lane.  A  charter  of  in 
corporation  was  granted  to  White  and  twelve  of  his  principal 
associates,  as  Governor  and  Assistants  of  the  City  of  Raleigh 
in  Virginia.  In  the  hope  of  evading  the  unprosperous  issue 
of  the  former  expeditions,  more  efficacious  means  were  adopt 
ed,  in  the  equipment  of  this  squadron,  for  preserving  and 
continuing  the  colony.  The  stock  of  provisions  was  more 
abundant,  the  number  of  men  greater,  and  the  means  of  re 
cruiting  their  numbers  afforded  by  a  competent  intermixture 
of  women.  But  the  full  extent  of  the  precedent  calamities 
had  yet  to  be  learned  ;  and  on  landing  at  Roanoke,  in  quest 
of  the  detachment  that  Grenville  had  placed  there,  White  and 
his  companions  could  find  no  other  trace  of  it  than  the  signifi 
cant  memorial  presented  by  a  dismantled  fort  and  a  heap  of 
human  bones.1  The  apprehensions  excited  by  this  melan 
choly  spectacle  were  confirmed  by  the  intelligence  of  a  friendly 
native,  who  informed  them  that  their  countrymen  had  fallen 
victims  to  the  enmity  of  the  Indians.  Instructed  rather  than 
discouraged  by  this  calamity,  they  endeavoured  to  cultivate  the 
good-will  of  the  savages  ;  and,  determining  to  remain  at  Roa 
noke,  they  hastened  to  repair  the  houses  and  restore  the  colo 
ny.  One  of  the  natives  was  baptized  into  the  Christian  faith, 
and,  retaining  an  unshaken  attachment  to  the  English,  con 
tributed  his  efforts  to  pacify  and  conciliate  his  countrymen.2 
But,  finding  themselves  destitute  of  many  articles  which  they 
judged  essential  to  their  comfort  and  preservation  in  a  country 
thickly  covered  with  forests  and  peopled  only  by  a  few  scat 
tered  tribes  of  savages,  the  colonists  deputed  their  governor  to 
•solicit  for  them  the  requisite  supplies  ;  and  White  repaired  for 
this  purpose  to  England.  In  his  voyage  thither  he  touched 
at  a  port  in  Ireland,  where  he  is  reported  to  have  introduced 

1  Smith.  s  Ibid. 


28  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

the  first  specimens  ever  seen  in  Europe  of  the  potato  plant, 
which  he  had  brought  with  him  from  America.  But  whether 
this  memorable  importation  was  due  to  him,  or,  as  some 
writers  have  affirmed,  to  certain  of  the  earlier  associates  of 
Raleigh's  adventures,  it  must  be  acknowledged  that  to  the 
enterprise  of  Raleigh  and  the  soil  of  America  Great  Britain 
is  indebted  for  her  acquaintance  with  the  potato  and  with  to 
bacco,  —  the  staple  article  of  diet,  and  the  most  cherished 
as  well  as  the  most  innocent  luxury,  of  a  great  portion  of 
her  people. 

White  arrived  at  a  juncture  very  unfavorable  for  the  suc 
cess  of  his  mission.  England  was  now  engrossed  with  the 
more  immediate  concern  of  self-preservation  :  the  formidable 
armada  of  Spain  was  preparing  to  invade  her,  and  the  whole 
naval  and  military  resources  of  the  empire  were  placed  under 
requisition  for  the  purposes  of  national  defence.  The  hour  of 
his  country's  danger  could  not  fail  to  present  the  most  inter 
esting  employment  to  the  generous  spirit  of  Raleigh  ;  yet  he 
mingled  with  his  distinguished  efforts  to  repel  the  enemy  some 
exertions  for  the  preservation  of  the  colony  which  he  had  plant 
ed.  For  this  purpose,  he  had,  with  his  usual  promptitude, 
equipped  a  small  squadron,  which  he  committed  to  the  conduct 
of  Sir  Richard  Grenville,  when  the  queen  interposed  to  detain 
the  ships  that  were  adapted  for  fight,  and  to  prohibit  Grenville 
from  leaving  England  at  such  a  crisis.  White,  however,  was 
enabled  to  ree'mbark  for  America  with  two  small  vessels 
[1588]  ;  but,  yielding  to  the  temptation  of  trying  his  fortune  by 
the  way  in  a  cruise  against  the  Spaniards,  he  was  beaten  by  a 
superior  force,  and  totally  disabled  from  pursuing  his  voyage. 
The  colony  at  Roanoke  was,  in  consequence,  left  to  depend 
on  its  own  feeble  resources,  of  which  the  diligent  cultivation 
was  not  likely  to  be  promoted  by  the  hopes  that  were  enter 
tained  of  foreign  succour.  [1589.]  What  its  fate  was  may 
be  easily  guessed,  but  never  was  certainly  known.  White, 
conducting  an  expedition  to  Roanoke  in  the  following  year, 
found  the  territory  evacuated  of  the  colonists,  of  whom  no 
further  tidings  were  ever  obtained.1 

1  Smith.     Stith.     Williamson's  History  of  North  Carolina. 


CHAP.  I.]        ASSIGNMENT  OF  RALEIGH'S  PATENT.  29 

This  last  expedition  was  not  despatched  by  Raleigh,  but  by 
his  successors  in  the  American  patent ;  and  our  history  is  now 
to  take  leave  of  that  illustrious  man,  with  whose  schemes  and 
enterprises  it  ceases  to  have  any  farther  connection.  The  ar 
dor  of  his  mind  was  not  exhausted,  but  diverted  by  a  multi 
plicity  of  new  and  not  less  important  concerns.  Intent  on 
peopling  and  improving  a  large  district  in  Ireland  which  the 
queen  had  conferred  on  him,  engaged  in  the  conduct  of  a 
scheme  and  the  expense  of  an  armament  for  establishing  Don 
Antonio  on  the  throne  of  Portugal,  and  already  revolving  his 
last  and  wildest  project  of  an  expedition  for  the  discovery  of 
mines  in  Guiana,  he  found  it  impossible  to  continue  either  the 
attention  or  the  expenditure  which  he  had  devoted  to  his 
American  colony.  Yet  desiring  with  earnest  inclination  that 
a  design  which  he  had  so  gallantly  and  steadfastly  pursued 
should  not  be  entirely  abandoned,  and  hoping  that  the  spirit  of 
commerce  would  preserve  an  intercourse  with  America  that 
might  terminate  in  a  colonial  settlement,  he  consented  to  assign 
his  patent  to  Sir  Thomas  Smith  and  a  company  of  merchants 
in  London,  who  undertook  to  establish  and  maintain  a  traffic 
between  England  and  Virginia.  The  patent  which  he  thus 
transferred  had  already  cost  him  forty  thousand  pounds,  without 
affording  him  the  slightest  return  of  pecuniary  profit ;  yet  the 
only  personal  consideration  for  which  he  stipulated  with  the  as 
signees  was  a  small  share  of  whatever  gold  or  silver  ore  they 
might  eventually  discover  ;  and  he  now  bestowed  on  them,  in 
addition  to  his  previous  disbursements,  a  donation  of  one  hun 
dred  pounds,  in  aid  of  the  efforts  to  which  they  pledged  them 
selves  for  the  propagation  of  Christianity  in  America.1 

It  appeared  very  soon  that  Raleigh  had  transferred  his 
patent  to  hands  very  different  from  his  own.  The  last-men 
tioned  expedition,  which  was  productive  of  nothing  but  tidings 
of  the  miscarriage  of  a  prior  adventure,  was  the  most  notable 
effort  that  the  London  company  exerted.  Satisfied  with  a 
paltry  traffic  conducted  by  a  few  small  vessels,  they  made  no 
attempt  to  take  possession  of  the  country  ;  and  at  the  period 
of  Elizabeth's  death,  not  a  single  Englishman  was  settled  in 

1  Hazard.     Campbell's  History  of  Virginia. 


30  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

America.  The  exertions  of  Raleigh,  however,  had  united  the 
views  and  hopes  of  his  countrymen,  by  a  strong  association, 
with  settlements  in  Virginia,  and  given  a  bias  to  the  national 
spirit  which  only  the  encouragement  of  more  favorable  cir 
cumstances  was  wanting  to  develope.  But  the  war  with  Spain, 
that  endured  till  the  close  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  allured  men  of 
enterprise  and  activity  into  the  career  of  predatory  adventure, 
and  obstructed  the  formation  of  peaceable  and  commercial  set 
tlements. 

The  accession  of  James  to  the  English  crown  [1603]  was,  by 
a  singular  coincidence,  an  event  no  less  favorable  to  the  coloni 
zation  of  America  than  fatal  to  the  illustrious  projector  of  this 
design.  Peace  was  immediately  concluded  with  Spain  ;  and 
England,  in  the  enjoyment  of  uninterrupted  tranquillity,  was 
enabled  to  direct  to  more  bloodless  pursuits  the  energies  ma 
tured  in  a  war  which  had  excited  the  spirit  of  the  nation  with 
out  impairing  its  strength.  From  the  inability  of  government, 
in  that  age,  to  collect  all  the  disposable  force  of  the  empire  for 
combined  operation,  war  was  chiefly  productive  of  a  series  of 
partial  efforts  and  privateering  expeditions,  which  widely  dif 
fused  the  allurements  of  ambition  and  multiplied  the  opportu 
nities  of  advancement.  This  had  been  remarkably  exemplified 
in  the  contest  with  Spain  ;  and  many  ardent  spirits,  to  which 
this  contest  had  supplied  opportunities  of  animating  exertion 
and  flattering  ascendency,  became  impatient  of  the  restraint 
and  inactivity  to  which  the  peace  consigned  them,  and  began 
to  look  abroad  for  a  new  sphere  of  activity  and  distinction. 

The  prevalence  of  such  dispositions  naturally  led  to  a  reviv 
al  of  the  project  of  colonizing  North  America,  which  gained 
an  additional  recommendation  to  public  favor  from  the  success 
of  a  voyage  undertaken  in  the  last  year  of  Elizabeth's  reign. 
Bartholomew  Gosnold,  who  planned  and  performed  this  voyage 
in  a  small  vessel  containing  only  thirty  men,  was  led,  by  his 
experience  in  navigation,  to  suspect  that  the  proper  track  from 
Europe  to  America  had  not  yet  been  discovered,  and  that,  in 
steering  by  the  Canary  Islands  and  the  Gulf  of  Florida,  a  cir 
cuit  of  at  least  a  thousand  leagues  was  unnecessarily  made. 
In  prosecution  of  his  conjecture,  he  abandoned  the  southern 
track,  and,  steering  more  to  the  westward,  was  the  first  navi- 


CHAP.  I.]  GOSNOLD'S  VOYAGE.  31 

gator  who  reached  America  by  this  directer  course.  He  ar 
rived  at  a  more  northerly  quarter  of  the  continent  than  any  of 
Raleigh's  colonists  had  visited,  and,  landing  in  the  region 
which  now  forms  the  State  of  Massachusetts,  he  pursued  an 
advantageous  traffic  with  the  natives,  and  freighted  his  vessel 
with  abundance  of  rich  peltry.  He  visited  two  adjacent 
islands,  one  of  which  he  named  Martha's  Vineyard,  the  other 
Elizabeth's  Island.  The  aspect  of  the  country  appeared  so 
inviting  and  the  climate  so  salubrious,  that  twelve  of  the  crew 
at  first  determined  to  remain  there  ;  but,  reflecting  on  the 
melancholy  fate  of  the  colonists  at  Roanoke,  they  found  their 
resolution  unequal  to  their  wishes  ;  and  the  whole  party,  reluc 
tantly  quitting  the  agreeable  region,  returned  to  England  after 
an  absence  of  less  than  four  months.1 

The  report  of  this  expedition  produced  a  strong  impression 
on  the  public  mind,  and  led  to  important  consequences.  Gos- 
nold  had  discovered  a  route  that  greatly  shortened  the  voyage 
to  North  America,  and  found  a  healthy  climate,  a  fertile  soil, 
and  a  coast  abounding  with  excellent  harbours.  He  had  seen 
many  fruits,  that  were  highly  esteemed  in  Europe,  growing 
plentifully  in  the  American  woods  ;  and,  having  sown  some 
European  grain,  beheld  it  germinate  with  rapidity  and  vigor. 
Encouraged  by  his  success,  and  perhaps  not  insensible  to  the 
hope  of  finding  gold  and  silver,  or  some  new  and  lucrative 
article  of  commerce,  in  the  unexplored  interior  of  so  fine  a 
country,  he  endeavoured  to  procure  associates  in  an  enter 
prise  to  transport  a  colony  to  America.  Similar  projects 
were  generated  in  various  parts  of  the  kingdom  ;  but  the  spirit 
of  adventure  was  controlled  by  a  salutary  caution,  awakened 
by  the  recollection  of  former  disappointments. 

These  projects  were  zealously  promoted  by  the  counsel 
and  encouragement  of  Richard  Hakluyt,  prebendary  of  West 
minster,  a  man  of  eminent  attainments  in  naval  and  commer 
cial  science,  the  patron  and  counsellor  of  many  of  the  Eng 
lish  expeditions  of  discovery,  the  correspondent  of  the  leaders 
who  conducted  them,  and  the  historian  of  the  exploits  they  gave 
rise  to.  At  his  suggestion,2  two  vessels  were  fitted  out  by 

1  Purchas.     Smith.     Stith.  !  Smith. 


32  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

the  merchants  of  Bristol,  and  despatched  to  examine  the  dis 
coveries  of  Gosnold  and  verify  his  statements.  [1603.]  They 
returned  with  an  ample  confirmation  of  the  navigator's  veracity. 
A  similar  expedition  was  equipped  and  despatched  by  the  Earl 
of  Southampton  and  Lord  Arundel  of  Wardour l  [1605], 
which  not  only  produced  farther  testimony  to  the  same  ef 
fect,  but  reported  so  many  additional  particulars  commendato 
ry  of  the  region,  that  all  doubt  and  hesitation  vanished  from  the 
minds  of  the  projectors  of  American  colonization  ;  and  an 
association,  sufficiently  numerous,  wealthy,  and  powerful  to 
undertake  this  enterprise,  being  speedily  formed,  a  petition  was 
presented  to  the  king  for  his  sanction  of  the  plan,  and  the 
interposition  of  his  authority  towards  its  execution. 

The  attention  of  James  had  been  previously  directed  to  the 
advantages  attending  the  plantation  of  colonies,  at  the  time 
when  he  attempted  to  civilize  the  more  barbarous  clans  of  his 
original  subjects  by  introducing  detachments  of  industrious 
traders  from  the  low  country  into  the  Highlands  of  Scotland.2 
Well  pleased  to  resume  a  favorite  speculation,  and  willing  to 
encourage  a  scheme  that  opened  a  safe  and  peaceful  career  to 
the  active  genius  of  his  new  subjects,  he  hearkened  readily  to 
the  application  ;  and,  highly  commending  the  plan,  acceded  to 
the  wishes  of  its  projectors.  Letters  patent  were  issued  [April, 
1606]  to  Sir  Thomas  Gates,  Sir  George  Somers,  Richard 
Hakluyt,  and  their  associates,  granting  to  them  those  territories 
in  America  lying  on  the  seacoast  between  the  thirty-fourth  and 
forty-fifth  degrees  of  north  latitude,  together  with  all  islands  sit 
uated  within  a  hundred  miles  of  their  shores.  The  design  of 
the  patentees  was  declared  to  be,  "  to  make  habitation  and 
plantation,  and  to  deduce  a  colony  of  sundry  of  our  people 
into  that  part  of  America  commonly  called  Virginia"  ;  and,  as 
the  main  recommendation  of  the  design,  it  was  proclaimed, 
that  "  so  noble  a  work  may,  by  the  providence  of  Almighty 
God,  hereafter  tend  to  the  glory  of  his  Divine  Majesty,  in  prop 
agating  of  Christian  religion  to  such  people  as  yet  live  in  dark 
ness  and  miserable  ignorance  of  the  true  knowledge  and  wor 
ship  of  God,  and  may,  in  time,  bring  the  infidels  and  savages 

1  Smith.     Oldmixon.  2  Robertson's  History  of  Scotland. 


CHAP.  I.]  THE  LONDON  AND  PLYMOUTH  COMPANIES.   33 

living  in  those  parts  to  human  civility,  and  to  a  settled  and 
quiet  government."  The  patentees  were  required  to  divide 
themselves  into  two  distinct  companies  ;  the  one  consisting 
of  London  adventurers,  whose  projected  establishment  was 
termed  the  first  or  southern  colony  ;  the  second  or  northern 
colony  devolving  on  a  company  composed  of  merchants  be 
longing  to  Plymouth  and  Bristol. 

The  territory  appropriated  to  the  first  or  southern  colony 
was  generally  called  Virginia,  and  preserved  that  appellation 
after  the  region  assigned  to  the  second  or  northern  colony  ob 
tained,  in  1614,  the  name  of  New  England.  The  adventurers 
were  authorized  to  transport  to  their  respective  territories  as 
many  English  subjects  as  might  be  willing  to  accompany  them, 
and  to  make  shipments  of  arms  and  provisions  for  their  use, 
with  exemption  from  custom-house  dues  for  the  space  of  seven 
years.  The  colonists  and  their  children  were  to  enjoy  the 
same  liberties  and  privileges  in  the  American  settlements  as 
if  they  had  remained  or  been  born  in  England.1  The  admin 
istration  of  each  of  the  colonies  was  committed  to  two  boards 
of  council  ;  the  supreme  government  being  vested  in  a  board 
resident  in  England,  which  was  to  be  nominated  by  the  king, 
and  directed  in  its  proceedings  by  such  ordinances  as  he 
might  enact ;  and  a  subordinate  jurisdiction,  which  included 
the  functions  of  executive  power,  devolving  on  a  colonial 
council,  which,  like  the  other,  was  to  be  created  by  royal  ap 
pointment,  and  regulated  by  the  application  of  royal  wisdom 
and  authority.  Liberty  to  search  for  and  open  mines  (which, 
under  all  the  feudal  governments,  were  supposed  to  have  been 
originally  reserved  to  the  sovereign)  was  conferred  on  the 
colonists,  — with  an  appropriation,  however,  of  part  of  the  min 
eral  and  metallic  produce  to  the  crown  ;  and  the  more  val 
uable  privilege  of  unrestrained  freedom  of  trade  with  other 

1  This  provision  (whether  suggested  by  the  caution  of  the  prince  or  the  ap 
prehension  of  the  colonists)  occurs  in  almost  all  the  colonial  charters.  It  is, 
however,  omitted  in  the  most  elaborate  of  them  all,  the  charter  of  Pennsyl 
vania,  which  was  revised  and  finally  adjusted  by  that  eminent  lawyer,  the 
Lord  Keeper  Guildford.  When  King  William  was  about  to  renew  the  char 
ter  of  Massachusetts,  after  the  British  Revolution,  he  was  advised  by  the 
ablest  lawyers  in  England  that  such  a  provision  was  nugatory  ;  the  law  neces 
sarily  inferring  (they  declared)  that  the  colonists  were  Englishmen,  and  both 
entitled  to  the  rights,  and  obliged  to  the  duties,  attached  to  the  character  of 
subjects  of  the  English  crown.  Chalmers's  Jlnnals. 

VOL.    I.  5 


34  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

nations  was  also  extended  to  them.  The  president  and  coun 
cil  within  the  colonies  were  authorized  to  levy  duties  on  foreign 
commodities,  which,  for  twenty-one  years,  were  to  be  applied 
to  the  use  of  the  adventurers,  and  afterwards  to  be  paid  into 
the  royal  exchequer.1 

The  terms  of  this  charter  afford  an  illustration  both  of  the 
character  of  the  monarch  who  granted,  and  of  the  designs  of 
the  persons  who  procured  it.  By  neither  of  these  parties 
was  the  formation  of  a  solid  and  liberal  social  establishment 
either  aimed  at  or  preconceived.  The  arbitrary  spirit  of  the 
royal  grantor  is  discernible  in  the  subjection  of  the  emigrant 
body  to  a  corporation  in  which  they  were  not  represented,  and 
over  whose  deliberations  they  possessed  no  control.  There 
is  likewise  a  manifest  inconsistency  between  the  assurance  of 
participation  in  all  the  privileges  of  Englishmen  to  the  colo 
nists,  and  the  reservation  of  legislative  power  exclusively  to 
the  king,  the  control  of  whose  legislative  functions  constitutes 
the  most  valuable  political  privilege  that  Englishmen  enjoy. 
But  we  have  no  reason  to  suppose  that  the  charter  was  un 
acceptable  to  the  patentees  ;  on  the  contrary,  its  most  ob 
jectionable  provisions  are  not  more  congenial  to  the  charac 
ter  of  the  king,  than  conformable  to  the  views  which  the 
leading  members  of  that  body  plainly  appear  to  have  enter 
tained.  Their  object  (notwithstanding  the  more  liberal  designs 
professed  in  the  charter)  was  rather  to  explore  the  continent 
and  appropriate  its  supposed  treasures,  by  the  agency  of  a 
body  of  adventurers  over  whom  they  retained  an  entire  con 
trol,  than  to  establish  a  permanent  and  extensive  settlement. 
The  instructions  to  the  provincial  governors,  which  accom 
panied  the  second  shipment  despatched  by  the  London  com 
pany,  demonstrated,  very  disagreeably  to  the  wiser  emigrants 
and  very  injuriously  to  the  rest,  that  the  purposes  with  which 
their  rulers  were  mainly  engrossed  were  not  patient  industry 
and  colonization,  but  territorial  discovery  and  hasty  gain.2  In 
furtherance  of  these  views,  the  leading  patentees  were  care 
ful,  by  mixing  no  women  with  the  first  emigrants,  to  retain 
the  colony  in  dependence  upon  England  for  its  supplies  of 

1  Stith.     Hazard.  2  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]  COLONIAL   CODE   OF  JAMES  I.  35 

people,  and  to  give  free  scope  to  the  cupidity  and  the  roving 
spirit  of  minds,  undivided  by  the  cares,  and  unfixed  by  the 
habits  and  attachments,  of  domestic  life. 

The  king  appears  to  have  entertained  ideas  somewhat  more 
liberal,  and  a  more  genuine  purpose  of  colonization,  than  the 
patentees.  While  their  leaders  were  employed  in  making 
preparations  to  reap  the  benefits  of  their  charter,  James  was 
assiduously  engaged  in  the  task,  which  his  vanity  rendered  a 
rich  enjoyment,  and  the  well  guarded  liberties  of  England  a 
rare  one,  of  digesting  a  code  of  laws  for  the  projected  colo 
nies.  This  code,  issued  under  the  sign  manual  and  privy  seal, 
enjoined  the  preaching  of  the  gospel  in  America,  and  the  per 
formance  of  divine  worship,  in  conformity  with  the  doctrines 
and  rites  of  the  church  of  England.  Legislative  and  execu 
tive  functions  within  the  colonies  were  conferred  on  the  pro 
vincial  councils  ;  but  with  this  controlling  provision,  that  laws 
originating  there  should,  in  substance,  be  consonant  to  the 
English  laws  ;  that  they  should  continue  in  force  only  till  modi 
fied  or  repealed  by  the  king  or  the  supreme  council  in  Eng 
land  ;  and  that  their  penal  inflictions  should  not  extend  to 
death  or  demembration.  Persons  attempting  to  withdraw  the 
colonists  from  their  allegiance  to  the  English  crown  were  to 
be  imprisoned  ;  or,  in  -cases  highly  aggravated,  to  be  remitted 
for  trial  to  England.  Tumults,  mutiny,  rebellion,  murder,  and 
incest  were  to  be  punished  with  death  ;  and  for  these  offences 
the  culprit  was  to  be  tried  by  a  jury.  Summary  trial  was 
appointed  for  inferior  misdemeanours,  and  their  punishment  in 
trusted  to  the  discretion  of  the  president  and  council.  Lands 
were  to  be  holden  by  the  same  tenures  that  prevailed  in  Eng 
land  ;  but,  for  five  years  after  the  plantation  of  each  colony,  a 
community  of  labor  and  gains  was  to  have  place  among  the 
colonists.  Kindness  to  the  heathen  inhabitants  of  America, 
and  the  communication  of  religious  instruction  to  them,  were 
enjoined.  And,  finally,  power  was  reserved  to  the  king  and 
his  successors  to  enact  further  laws,  in  consistence  always 
with  the  jurisprudence  of  England.1 

These  regulations,  in  the  main,  are  creditable  to  the  sov- 

1  Stith. 


36  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ereign  who  composed  them.  No  attempt  was  made,  nor  right 
pretended,  to  legislate  for  the  Indian  tribes  of  America  ;  and 
if  the  large  territories,  which  these  savages  rather  claimed  than 
occupied,  were  appropriated  and  disposed  of  without  any  re 
gard  to  their  pretensions,  at  least  no  jurisdiction  was  assumed 
over  their  actions,  and,  in  point  of  personal  liberty,  they  were 
regarded  as  an  independent  people.  This  was  an  advance  in 
equity  beyond  the  practice  of  the  Spaniards  and  the  ideas  of 
Queen  Elizabeth,  whose  patent  asserted  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
English  crown  and  laws  over  the  old  as  well  as  the  new  in 
habitants  of  her  projected  colonies.  In  the  criminal  legislation 
of  this  code,  we  may  observe  a  distinction  which  trial  by  jury 
has  enabled  to  prevail  over  that  ingenious  and  perhaps  ex 
pedient  rule  of  ancient  colonial  policy,  which  intrusted  procon 
sular  governors  with  the  power  of  inflicting  death,  but  re 
strained  them  from  awarding  less  formidable  penalties,  as  more 
likely  to  invite  the  indulgence  of  interest  or  caprice.  If  the 
charter,  in  some  of  its  provisions,  betrayed  a  total  disregard  of 
political  liberty,  the  code,  in  establishing  trial  by  jury,  inter 
wove  with  the  very  origin  of  society  a  habit  and  practice  well 
adapted  to  cherish  the  spirit  and  principles  of  freedom. 

The  London  company,  to  which  the  plantation  of  the  south 
ern  colony  was  committed,  applied  themselves  promptly  to  the 
formation  of  a  colonial  settlement.  But,  though  many  persons 
of  distinction  were  included  among  the  proprietors,  their  funds 
at  first  were  scanty,  and  their  early  efforts  proportionally 
feeble.  Three  small  vessels,  of  which  the  largest  did  not  ex 
ceed  a  hundred  tons  burden,1  under  the  command  of  Captain 
Newport,  formed  the  first  squadron  that  was  to  execute  what 
had  been  so  long  and  so  vainly  attempted,  and  sailed  with  a 
hundred  and  five  men  destined  to  remain  in  America.  Several 
of  these  emigrants  were  members  of  distinguished  families,  — 
particularly  George  Percy,  a  brother  of  the  Earl  of  Northum 
berland  ;  and  several  were  officers  of  reputation,  —  of  whom 
we  may  notice  Bartholomew  Gosnold,  the  navigator,  and  Cap 
tain  John  Smith,  one  of  the  most  distinguished  ornaments  of 
an  age  that  was  prolific  of  memorable  men. 

1  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]  COLONY  AT  JAMESTOWN.  37 

Thus,  at  length,  after  a  research  fraught  with  perplexity  and 
disappointment,  but  assuredly  not  devoid  of  interest,  into  the 
sources  of  the  great  transatlantic  commonwealth,  we  have 
reached  the  first  inconsiderable  spring,  whose  progress,  op 
posed  by  innumerable  obstructions,  and  nearly  diverted  in  its 
very  outset,  yet  always  continuous,  expands  under  the  eye  of 
patient  inquiry  into  the  grand  and  grandly  spreading  stream  of 
American  population.  After  the  lapse  of  a  hundred  and  ten 
years  from  the  discovery  of  the  continent  by  Cabot,  and  twen 
ty-two  years  after  its  first  occupation  by  Raleigh,  was  the  num 
ber  of  the  English  colonists  limited  to  a  hundred  and  five  ;  and 
this  handful  of  men  l  undertook  the  arduous  task  of  peopling  a 
remote  and  uncultivated  land,  covered  with  woods  and  marshes, 
and  inhabited  only  by  tribes  of  savages  and  beasts  of  prey. 
Under  the  sanction  of  a  charter,  which  bereaved  Englishmen 
of  their  most  valuable  rights,  and  banished  from  the  constitu 
tion  of  American  society  the  first  principles  of  liberty,  were 
the  foundations  laid  of  the  colonial  greatness  of  England,  and 
of  the  freedom  and  prosperity  of  America.  From  this  period, 
or  at  least  very  shortly  after,  a  regular  and  connected  history 
ensues  of  the  progress  of  Virginia  and  New  England,  the  two 
eldest-born  colonies,  whose  example  promoted  the  rise,  as 
their  shelter  protected  the  weakness,  of  the  others  which  were 
successively  planted  and  reared. 

Newport  and  his  squadron,  pursuing,  for  some  unknown 
reason,  jhe  wider  compass  taken  by  the  first  navigators  to 
America,  instead  of  the  less  circuitous  track  that  had  been  re 
cently  ascertained,  did  not  accomplish  their  voyage  in  a  shorter 
period  than  four  months  ;  but  its  termination  was  rendered  pe 
culiarly  fortunate  by  the  effect  of  a  storm,  which  defeated  their 
purpose  of  landing  and  settling  at  Roanoke,  and  carried  them 
into  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake.  [April,  1607.]  As  they  advanced 
through  its  waters,  they  easily  perceived  the  advantage  that  would 
be  gained  by  establishing  their  settlement  on  the  shores  of  this 
spacious  haven,  replenished  by  the  tributary  floods  of  so  many 
great  rivers,  which  fertilize  the  soil  of  that  extensive  district 

1  "  Never  was  the  prophetic  declaration,  that '  a  little  one  shall  become  a 
thousand,  and  a  small  one  a  strong  nation,'  more  wonderfully  exemplified  than 
in  the  planting  and  rearing  of  these  colonies."  General  Cass.  Discourse. 
(1836.) 


38  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

of  America,  and,  affording  commodious  inlets  into  the  interior 
parts,  facilitate  their  foreign  commerce  and  mutual  communica 
tion.  Newport  first  landed  on  a  promontory  forming  the  south 
ern  boundary  of  the  bay,  which,  in  honor  of  the  Prince  of 
Wales,  he  named  Cape  Henry.  Thence,  coasting  the  south 
ern  shore,  he  entered  a  river  which  the  natives  called  Pow- 
hatan,  and  explored  its  banks  for  the  space  of  forty  miles  from 
its  mouth.  Impressed  with  the  superior  convenience  of  the 
coast  and  soil  to  which  they  had  been  thus  happily  conducted, 
the  adventurers  unanimously  determined  to  make  this  the  place 
of  their  abode.  They  gave  to  their  infant  settlement,  as  well 
as  to  the  neighbouring  river,  the  name  of  their  king  ;  and 
Jamestown  retains  the  distinction  of  being  the  oldest  existing 
habitation  of  the  English  in  America.1 

But  the  dissensions  that  broke  out  among  the  colonists  soon 
threatened  to  deprive  them  of  all  the  advantages  of  their  for 
tunate  territorial  position.  Their  animosities  were  inflamed  by 
an  arrangement,  which,  if  it  did  not  originate  with  the  king,  at 
least  betrays  a  strong  affinity  to  that  ostentatious  mystery  and 
driftless  artifice  which  he  affected  as  the  perfection  of  politi 
cal  dexterity.  The  names  of  the  provincial  council  were  not 
communicated  to  the  adventurers  when  they  departed  from 
England  ;  but  the  commission  which  contained  them  was  in 
closed  in  a  sealed  packet,  which  was  directed  to  be  opened 
within  twenty-four  hours  after  their  arrival  on  the  coast  of  Vir 
ginia,  when  the  counsellors  were  to  be  installed  in  their  office, 
and  to  elect  their  own  president.  The  disagreements,  incident 
to  a  long  voyage  and  a  band  of  adventurers  rather  conjoined 
than  united,  had  free  scope  among  men  unaware  of  the  r<?la- 
tions  they  were  to  occupy  towards  each  other,  and  of  the  sub 
ordination  which  their  relative  and  allotted  functions  might  im 
ply  ;  and  when  the  names  of  the  council  were  proclaimed,  the 
disclosure  was  far  from  affording  satisfaction.  Captain  Smith, 
whose  superior  talents  and  spirit  excited  the  envy  and  jealousy 
of  his  colleagues,  was  excluded  from  a  seat  in  the  council 
which  the  commission  authorized  him  to  assume,  and  even  ac 
cused  of  traitorous  designs  so  unproved  and  improbable,  that 
none  less  believed  the  charge  than  the  persons  who  preferred 

1  Stith. 


CHAP.  I.]  SUFFERINGS  OF  THE  COLONISTS.  39 

it.  The  privation  of  his  counsel  and  services  in  the  difficul 
ties  of  their  outset  was  a  serious  loss  to  the  colonists,  and 
might  have  been  attended  with  ruin  to  the  settlement,  if  his 
merit  and  generosity  had  not  been  superior  to  their  mean  in 
justice.  The  jealous  suspicions  of  the  individual  who  was 
elected  president  restrained  the  use  of  arms,  and  discouraged 
the  construction  of  fortifications  ;  and  a  misunderstanding  hav 
ing  arisen  with  the  Indians,  the  colonists,  unprepared  for  hos 
tilities,  suffered  severely  from  one  of  the  sudden  attacks  char 
acteristic  of  the  warfare  of  those  savages.1 

Newport  had  been  ordered  to  return  with  the  ships  to  Eng 
land  ;  and  as  the  time  of  his  departure  approached,  the  ac 
cusers  of  Smith,  with  affected  clemency,  proposed  that  he  also 
should  return  with  Newport,  instead  of  abiding  a  criminal 
prosecution  in  Virginia.  But,  happily  for  the  colony,  he 
scorned  so  to  compromise  his  integrity  ;  and,  demanding  a 
trial,  was  honorably  acquitted,  and  took  his  seat  in  the  coun 
cil.2 

The  fleet  was  better  victualled  than  the  magazines  of  the 
colony  ;  and  while  it  remained  with  them,  the  colonists  were 
permitted  to  share  the  plenty  enjoyed  by  the  sailors.  But 
when  Newport  set  sail  for  England,  they  found  themselves 
limited  to  scanty  supplies  of  unwholesome  provisions  ;  and  the 
sultry  heat  of  the  climate,  and  moisture  of  a  country  overgrown 
with  wood,  cooperating  with  the  defects  of  their  diet,  brought 
on  diseases  that  raged  with  fatal  violence.  Before  the  month 
of  September,  one  half  of  their  number  had  miserably  perished  ; 
and  among  these  victims  was  Bartholomew  Gosnold,  who 
planned  the  expedition,  and  materially  contributed  to  its  ac 
complishment.  This  scene  of  suffering  was  embittered  by  in 
ternal  dissensions.  The  president  was  accused  of  embezzling 
the  public  stores,  and  finally  detected  in  an  attempt  to  seize 
a  pinnace  and  escape  from  the  colony  and  its  calamities.  At 
length,  in  the  extremity  of  their  distress,  when  ruin  seemed  to 
impend  alike  from  famine  and  the  fury  of  the  savages,  the 
colonists  obtained  a  complete  and  unexpected  deliverance, 
which  the  piety  of  Smith  ascribed  to  the  influence  of  God  in 

1  Smith.  »  Ibid 


40  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

suspending  the  passions  and  controlling  the  sentiments  and 
purposes  of  men.  The  savages,  actuated  by  a  sudden  and 
generous  change  of  feeling,  not  only  refrained  from  molesting 
them,  but  gratuitously  brought  to  them  a  supply  of  provisions 
so  liberal,  as  at  once  to  dissipate  their  apprehensions  of  famine 
and  hostility.1 

Resuming  their  spirit,  the  colonists  now  proved  themselves 
not  wholly  uninstructed  by  their  misfortunes.  In  seasons  of 
exigency  merit  is  illustrated,  and  the  envy  that  pursues  it  is 
absorbed  by  deeper  interest  and  alarm.  The  sense  of  com 
mon  and  urgent  danger  promoted  a  willing  and  even  eager 
submission  to  the  man  whose  talents  were  most  likely  to  ex 
tricate  his  companions  from  the  difficulties  with  which  they 
were  encompassed.  Every  eye  was  now  turned  on  Smith,  and 
with  universal  acclaim  his  fellow-colonists  devolved  on  him  the 
authority  which  they  had  formerly  shown  so  much  jealousy  of 
his  acquiring.  This  individual,  whose  name  will  be  for  ever 
associated  with  the  foundation  of  civilized  society  in  America, 
was  descended  of  a  respectable  family  in  Lincolnshire,  and 
born  to  a  competent  fortune.  At  an  early  age,  his  lively  mind 
was  deeply  smitten  with  the  spirit  of  adventure  that  prevailed 
so  strongly  in  England  during  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  ;  and 
yielding  to  his  inclination,  he  had  passed  through  a  great  va 
riety  of  military  service,  with  little  pecuniary  gain,  but  high 
reputation,  and  with  the  acquisition  of  an  experience  the  more 
valuable  that  it  was  obtained  without  exhausting  his  ardor  or 
tainting  his  morals.2  The  vigor  of  his  constitution  had  pre 
served  his  health  unimpaired  amidst  the  general  sickness  ;  the 
undaunted  mettle  of  his  soul  retained  his  spirits  unbroken,  and 
his  judgment  unclouded,  amidst  the  general  misery  and  dejec 
tion  ;  and  his  adventurous  zeal,  which  once  attracted  the  re 
proach  of  overweening  ambition,  was  now  felt  to  diffuse  an  an 
imating  glow  of  hope  and  courage  among  all  around  him.  A 
strong  sense  of  religion  predominated  over  the  well  propor 
tioned  qualities  of  his  mind,  refreshed  his  confidence,  extended 
and  yet  regulated  his  views,  and  gave  dignity  to  his  character 
and  consistency  to  his  conduct.  Assuming  the  direction  of  the 

1  Smith.  *  Stith. 


CHAP.  I.]      CAPTURE   OF  SMITH   BY   THE   INDIANS.  41 

affairs  of  the  colonists,  he  promptly  adopted  the  only  policy 
that  could  save  them  from  destruction.  Under  his  directions, 
Jamestown  was  fortified  by  such  defences  as  were  sufficient 
to  repel  the  attacks  of  the  savages  ;  and  by  dint  of  great  la 
bor,  which  he  was  always  the  foremost  to  partake,  its  inhab 
itants  were  provided  with  dwellings  that  afforded  shelter  from 
the  weather,  and  contributed  to  restore  and  preserve  their 
health.  Finding  the  supplies  of  the  savages  discontinued,  he 
put  himself  at  the  head  of  a  detachment  of  his  people,  and 
penetrated  into  the  interior  of  the  country,  where,  by  courtesy 
and  liberality  to  the  tribes  whom  he  found  well  disposed,  and 
vigorous  retribution  of  the  hostility  of  such  as  were  otherwise 
minded,  he  succeeded  in  procuring  a  plentiful  stock  of  pro 
visions.1 

In  the  midst  of  his  successes,  he  was  surprised  [1607]  during 
an  expedition  by  a  band  of  hostile  savages,  who,  having  made 
him  prisoner,  after  a  gallant  and  nearly  successful  defence, 
prepared  to  inflict  on  him  the  usual  fate  of  their  captives.  His 
genius  and  presence  of  mind  did  not  desert  him  in  this  trying 
emergency.  He  desired  to  speak  with  the  sachem  or  chief 
of  the  tribe  to  which  he  was  a  prisoner  ;  and  presenting  him 
with  a  mariner's  compass,  expatiated  on  the  wonderful  discov 
eries  to  which  this  little  instrument  had  contributed,  —  descanted 
on  the  shape  of  the  earth,  the  extent  of  its  lands  and  oceans, 
the  course  of  the  sun,  the  varieties  of  nations,  and  the  singu 
larity  of  their  relative  terrestrial  positions,  which  made  some 
of  them  antipodes  to  the  others.  With  equal  prudence  and 
magnanimity  he  refrained  from  any  expression  of  solicitude 
for  his  life,  which  would  infallibly  have  weakened  or  counter 
acted  the  effect  which  he  studied  to  produce.  The  savages 
listened  to  him  with  amazement  and  admiration.  They  had 
handled  the  compass,  and  viewing  with  surprise  the  play  of 
the  needle,  which  they  plainly  saw,  but  found  it  impossible  to 
touch,  from  the  intervention  of  the  glass,  were  prepared  by 
this  marvellous  object  for  the  reception  of  those  sublime  and 
interesting  communications  by  which  their  captive  endeavoured 
to  gain  ascendency  over  their  minds.  For  an  hour  after  he 

1  Smith.    Stith. 
VOL.    I.  6 


42  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

had  finished  his  discourse,  they  remained  undecided  ;  till,  their 
accustomed  sentiments  reviving,  they  resumed  their  suspend 
ed  purpose,  and,  having  bound  him  to  a  tree,  prepared  to 
despatch  him  with  their  arrows.  But  a  deeper  impression  had 
been  made  on  their  chief ;  and  his  soul,  enlarged  for  a  season 
by  the  admission  of  knowledge,  or  subdued  by  the  influence 
of  wonder,  revolted  from  the  dominion  of  habitual  barbarity. 
This  chief  bore  the  harsh  and  uncouth  appellation  of  Opechan- 
canough,  —  a  name  which  the  subsequent  history  of  the  prov 
ince  was  to  invest  with  no  small  terror  and  celebrity.  Hold 
ing  up  the  compass  in  his  hand,  he  gave  the  signal  of  reprieve ; 
and  Smith,  though  still  guarded  as  a  prisoner,  was  conducted 
to  a  dwelling,  where  he  was  kindly  treated  and  plentifully  enter 
tained.1  But  the  strongest  impressions  pass  away,  while  the 
influence  of  habit  remains.  After  vainly  attempting  to  prevail 
on  their  captive  to  betray  the  English  colony  into  their  hands, 
the  Indians  referred  his  fate  to  Powhatan,  the  emperor  or  prin 
cipal  sachem  of  the  country,  to  whose  presence  they  conduct 
ed  him  in  triumphal  procession.  This  prince  received  him 
with  much  ceremony,  ordered  a  plentiful  repast  to  be  set 
before  him,  and  then  adjudged  him  to  suffer  death  by  having 
his  head  laid  on  a  stone  and  beaten  to  pieces  with  clubs.  At 
the  place  appointed  for  his  execution,  Smith  was  again  rescued 
from  impending  destruction  by  the  interposition  of  Pocahontas, 
the  favorite  daughter  of  the  king,  who,  finding  her  first  en 
treaties,  in  deprecation  of  the  captive's  intended  fate,  disre 
garded,  threw  her  arms  around  him,  and  passionately  declared 
her  determination  to  save  him  or  die  with  him.  Her  generous 
humanity  prevailed  over  the  cruelty  of  her  tribe  ;  and  the  king 
not  only  gave  Smith  his  life,  but  soon  after  sent  him  back  to 
Jamestown,  wiiere  the  beneficence  of  Pocahontas  continued  to 
follow  him  with  supplies  of  provisions,  that  delivered  the  colo 
nists  from  famine.2 

After  an  absence  of  seven  weeks,  Smith  returned  to  James 
town,  barely  in  time  to  prevent  the  desertion  of  the  colony. 
His  associates,  reduced  to  the  number  of  thirty-eight,  impa 
tient  of  farther  stay  in  a  country  where  they  had  met  with  so 

1  Smith.     Stith.  *  Smith. 


CHAP.   I.]     SMITH'S   INFLUENCE   OVER  THE   INDIANS.  43 

many  discouragements,  and  in  which  they  seemed  fated  to  re- 
enact  the  disasters  of  Roanoke,  were  preparing  to  abandon  the 
settlement  ;  and  it  was  not  without  the  utmost  difficulty,  and 
alternately  employing  persuasion,  remonstrance,  and  even  vio 
lent  interference,  that  Smith  prevailed  on  them  to  relinquish 
their  design.1  The  provisions  that  Pocahontas  sent  to  him 
relieved  their  present  wants  ;  his  account  of  the  plenty  he  had 
witnessed  among  the  Indians  revived  their  hopes  ;  and  he  en 
deavoured,  by  a  diligent  improvement  of  the  favorable  im 
pressions  he  had  made  on  the  savages,  and  by  a  judicious  regu 
lation  of  the  intercourse  between  them  and  the  colonists,  to 
promote  a  coalition  of  interests  and  reciprocation  of  advantages 
between  the  two  races  of  people.  His  generous  efforts  were 
successful  ;  he  preserved  a  steady  and  sufficient  supply  of  food 
to  the  English,  and  extended  his  influence  and  consideration 
with  the  Indians,  who  began  to  respect  and  consult  their  former 
captive  as  a  superior  being.  If  Smith  had  sought  only  to  mag 
nify  his  own  repute  and  establish  his  supremacy,  he  might 
easily  have  passed  with  the  savages  for  a  demi-god  ;  for  they 
were  not  more  averse  to  yield  the  allegiance  which  he  claimed 
for  their  Creator,  than  forward  to  tender  an  abject  homage  to 
himself,  and  to  ratify  the  loftiest  pretensions  he  might  advance 
in  his  own  behalf.  But  no  alluring  prospect  of  dominion  over 
men  could  tempt  him  to  forget  that  he  was  the  servant  of  God, 
or  aspire  to  be  regarded  in  any  other  light  by  his  fellow- 
creatures.  With  uncompromising  sincerity  he  labored  to  di 
vert  the  savages  from  their  idolatrous  superstition,  and  made 
them  all  aware,  that  the  man,  whose  superiority  they  acknowl 
edged,  despised  their  false  deities,  adored  the  true  God,  and 
obtained  from  his  gracious  communication  the  wisdom  which 
they  so  highly  commended.  His  pious  exertions  were  ob 
structed  by  imperfect  acquaintance  with  their  language,  and 
very  ill  seconded  by  the  conduct  of  his  associates,  which  con 
tributed  to  persuade  the  Indians  that  his  religion  was  something 
peculiar  to  his  own  person.  Partly  from  the  difficulties  of  his 
situation,  partly  from  the  defectiveness  of  his  tuition,  and, 
doubtless,  in  no  small  degree,  from  the  stubborn  blindness  and 

1  Smith. 


44  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

wilful  ignorance  of  the  persons  whom  he  attempted  to  instruct, 
Smith  succeeded  no  farther  than  Heriot  had  formerly  done. 
The  savages  extended  their  respect  for  the  man  to  a  Being 
whom  they  termed  "  the  God  of  Captain  Smith  "  ;  and  some 
of  them  acknowledged  that  this  Being  excelled  their  own  dei 
ties  in  the  same  proportion  that  artillery  excelled  bows  and  ar"- 
rows,  and  sent  deputies  to  Jamestown  to  entreat  that  Smith 
would  pray  for  rain,  when  their  idols  seemed  indisposed  or  un 
able  to  afford  them  a  supply.1  They  were  willing  enough  to 
believe  in  gods  made  after  the  image  of  themselves,  and  in  the 
partial  control  exercised  by  those  superior  beings  over  the  affairs 
of  men ;  but  the  announcement  of  an  Almighty  Creator,  the  great 
source  an  d  support  of  universal  existence,  presented  a  notion 
which  their  understandings  refused  to  admit,  and  required  a 
homage  which  their  hearts  revolted  from  yielding. 

While  the  affairs  of  the  colony  were  thus  prospering  under 
the  direction  of  Captain  Smith,  a  reinforcement  of  a  hundred 
and  twenty  men,  with  an  abundant  stock  of  provisions,  and  a 
supply  of  vegetable  seeds  and  instruments  of  husbandry,  arrived 
in  two  vessels  from  England.  [1608.]  The  colonists  were  not 
a  little  gladdened  by  this  accession  to  their  comforts  and  their 
force.  But,  unhappily,  the  jealousies,  which  danger  had  re 
strained  rather  than  extinguished,  again  budded  forth  in  this 
gleam  of  prosperity  ;  the  ascendency  which  Smith  exercised 
over  the  Indians  excited  the  envy  of  the  very  persons  whose 
lives  it  had  preserved  ;  and  his  authority  now  began  sensibly 
to  decline.  Nor  was  it  long  before  the  cessation  of  his  influ 
ence,  together  with  the  defects  in  the  composition  of  the  new 
body  of  emigrants,  gave  rise  to  the  most  serious  mischiefs  in 
the  colony.  The  restraints  of  discipline  were  relaxed,  and  a 
free  traffic  was  permitted  with  the  natives,  who  speedily  began  to 
complain  of  fraudulent  and  unequal  dealing,  and  to  exhibit  their 
former  animosity.  In  an  infant  settlement,  where  the  views 
and  pursuits  of  men  are  unfixed,  and  habitual  submission  to  au 
thority  has  yet  to  be  formed,  the  welfare,  and  indeed  the  ex 
istence,  of  society  are  much  more  dependent  on  the  manners 
and  moral  character  of  individuals,  than  on  the  influence  of 

1  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]         DECEPTIVE  INDICATIONS  OF  GOLD.  45 

laws.  But  in  recruiting  the  population  of  this  colony,  too  little 
consideration  was  shown  for  those  habits  and  occupations 
which  must  everywhere  form  the  basis  of  national  prosperity. 
This  arose  as  well  from  the  peculiar  views  of  the  proprietors, 
as  from  the  circumstances  of  the  English  people,  whose  work 
ing  classes  were  by  no  means  overcrowded,  and  among  whom, 
consequently,  the  persons,  whose  industry  and  moderation  best 
qualified  them  to  form  a  new  settlement,  were  the  least  dis 
posed  to  abandon  their  native  country.  Of  the  recruits  newly 
arrived  in  the  colony,  a  large  proportion  were  gentlemen,  a  few 
were  laborers,  and  several  were  jewellers  and  refiners  of  gold.1 
Unfortunately,  some  of  this  latter  description  of  artists  soon 
found  an  opportunity  of  exercising  their  peculiar  departments 
of  industry,  and  of  demonstrating  (though  too  late)  their  com 
plete  deficiency  even  of  the  worthless  qualifications  which  they 
professed. 

A  small  stream  of  water,  issuing  from  a  bank  of  sand  near 
Jamestown,  was  found  to  deposit  in  its  channel  a  glittering 
sediment  which  resembled  golden  ore,  and  was  fondly  mistaken 
for  this  precious  material  by  the  colonists.  Only  this  discov 
ery  was  wanting  to  reawaken  the  passions  which  America  had 
so  fatally  kindled  in  the  bosoms  of  her  first  European  invaders. 
The  depositation  of  the  ore  was  supposed  to  indicate  the 
neighbourhood  of  a  mine  ;  every  hand  was  eager  to  explore  ; 
and  considerable  quantities  of  the  dust  were  amassed,  and  sub 
jected  to  the  scrutiny  of  ignorance  prepossessed  by  the  strong 
est  and  most  deceptive  of  human  passions,  and  misled  by  the 
blundering  guidance  of  superficial  pretenders  to  superior  skill. 
Smith  exerted  himself  to  disabuse  his  countrymen,  and  vainly 
strove  to  stem  the  torrent  that  threatened  to  devastate  all  their 
prospects  ;  assuring  them,  with  prophetic  wisdom,  that  to  ad 
dict  themselves  to  mining  in  preference  to  agriculture  would  be 
to  squander  and  misdirect,  in  pursuit  of  a  phantom,  the  exer 
tions  on  which  their  subsistence  depended.  The  deceptive  dust, 
having  undergone  an  unskilful  assay  of  the  refiners  who  had 
recently  been  united  to  the  colony,  was  pronounced  to  be  ore 
of  a  very  rich  quality  ;  and  from  that  moment  the  thirst  of  gold 

1  Smith. 


46  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

was  inflamed  into  a  rage  that  reproduced  those  extravagant  ex 
cesses,  but,  happily,  without  conducting  to  the  same  profligate 
enormities,  for  which  the  followers  of  Cortes  and  Pizarro  were 
distinguished.  All  productive  industry  was  suspended,  and 
the  operations  of  mining  occupied  the  whole  conversation,  en 
grossed  every  thought,  and  absorbed  every  effort  of  the  colo 
nists.  The  two  vessels  that  had  brought  their  late  supplies, 
returning  to  England,  the  one  laden  with  this  valueless  dross, 
and  the  other  with  cedar  wood,  carried  the  first  remittance  that 
an  English  colony  ever  made  from  America.  [June,  1608.] 
They  conveyed  back  with  them,  also,  some  persons  who  had 
been  invested  and  despatched  to  the  colony  with  the  absurdly 
inappropriate  appointments  of  Admirals,  Recorders,  Chro- 
nologers,  and  Justices  of  the  Peace,  —  a  supply  as  useless  to 
America  as  the  remittance  of  dust  was  to  Europe.1  . 

Foreseeing  the  disastrous  issue  to  which  the  delusion  of  his 
associates  inevitably  tended,  Captain  Smith,  with  the  hope  of 
preventing  some  of  its  most  fatal  consequences,  conceived  the 
project  of  extending  his  researches  far  beyond  the  range  they 
had  hitherto  attained,  and  of  exploring  the  whole  of  the  great 
Bay  of  Chesapeake,  for  the  purpose  of  ascertaining  the  quali 
ties  and  resources  of  its  territories,  and  promoting  a  beneficial 
intercourse  with  the  remoter  tribes  of  its  inhabitants.  This 
arduous  design  he  executed  with  determined  resolution  and 
proportional  success  ;  and  while  his  fellow-colonists  were  ac 
tively  engaged  in  disappointing  the  hopes  of  England,  and  ri 
valling  the  sordid  excesses  that  had  characterized  the  adven 
turers  of  Spain,  he  singly  sustained  the  honor  of  his  country, 
and,  warmed  with  a  nobler  emulation,  achieved  an  enterprise 
that  equals  in  dignity,  and  surpasses  in  value,  the  most  cele 
brated  exploits  of  the  Spanish  discoverers.  When  we  com 
pare  the  slenderness  of  the  auxiliary  means  which  he  possessed, 
with  the  magnitude  of  the  results  which  he  accomplished,  with 
the  hardships  he  endured,  and  the  difficulties  he  overcame,  we 
recognize  in  this  achievement  a  monument  of  human  power  no 
less  eminent  than  honorable,  and  willingly  transmit  a  model  so 
well  calculated  to  warm  the  genius,  to  animate  the  fortitude, 

1  Smith.     Stith. 


CHAP.  I.]          EXPLORATION  OF  CHESAPEAKE  BAY.  47 

and  sustain  the  patience  of  mankind.  With  his  friend,  Dr. 
Russell,  and  a  small  company  of  followers,  whose  fortitude  and 
perseverance  he  was  frequently  obliged  to  resuscitate,  and  over 
whom  he  possessed  no  other  authority  than  the  ascendant  of  a 
vigorous  character  and  superior  intelligence,  he  performed,  in 
an  open  boat,  two  voyages  of  discovery,  that  occupied  more 
than  four  months,  and  embraced  a  navigation  of  above  three 
thousand  miles.  With  prodigious  labor  and  extreme  peril,  he 
visited  every  inlet  and  bay  on  both  sides  of  the  Chesapeake, 
from  Cape  Charles  to  the  River  Susquehannah  ;  he  sailed  up 
many  of  the  great  rivers  to  their  falls,  and  diligently  examined 
the  successive  territories  into  which  he  penetrated,  and  the  va 
rious  tribes  that  possessed  them.  He  brought  back  with  him 
an  account  so  ample,  and  a  plan  so  accurate,  of  that  great  por 
tion  of  the  American  continent  now  comprehended  in  the 
States  of  Virginia  and  Maryland,  that  all  the  subsequent  re 
searches  which  it  has  undergone  have  only  expanded  and  il 
lustrated  his  original  view  ;  and  his  map  has  been  made  the 
groundwork  of  all  posterior  delineations,  with  no  other  diversi 
ty  than  what  has  inevitably  arisen  from  the  varieties  of  appropri 
ation  and  the  progress  of  settlements.  But  to  come  and  to  see 
were  not  his  only  objects  ;  to  win  was  also  the  purpose  of  his 
enterprise,  and  the  effect  of  his  exertions.  In  his  intercourse 
with  the  various  tribes  which  he  visited,  he  displayed  the  ge 
nius  of  a  commander,  in  a  happy  exercise  of  all  those  talents 
that  overcome  the  antipathies  of  a  rude  people,  and  gain  at 
once  the  respect  and  good-will  of  mankind.  By  the  wisdom 
and  liberality  with  which  he  negotiated  and  traded  with  the 

I  friendly,  and  by  the  courage  and  vigor  with  which  he  repelled 
and  overcame  the  hostile,  he  succeeded  in  inspiring  the  savages 
,  with  the  most  exalted  opinion  of  himself  and  his  nation,  and 
paved  the  way  to  an  intercourse  that  promised  important  ad 
vantage  to  the  Virginian  colony.1  This  was,  indeed,  the  he 
roic  age  of  North  America  ;  and  such  were  the  men,  and  such 
the  labors,  by  which  the  first  foundations  of  her  greatness  and 
prosperity  were  laid. 

While  this  expedition  was  in  progress,  the  golden  dreams 

1  Russell,  apud  Smith.     Bagnal,  eod.  Joe. 


48  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

of  the  colonists  were  finally  dispelled  ;  and  they  had  awaked 
to  all  the  miseries  of  sickness,  scarcity,  disappointment,  and 
discontent,  when  Smith  once  more  returned  to  reanimate  their 
drooping  spirits  with  his  success,  and  relieve  their  wants  by 
the  resources  he  had  created.  Shortly  after  his  return,  he  was 
chosen  President  by  the  council  [10th  Sept.  1608]  ;  and  ac 
cepting  the  office,  he  employed  his  influence  so  efficiently  with 
the  savages,  that  immediate  scarcity  was  banished,  and  exerted 
his  authority  so  vigorously  and  judiciously  in  the  colony,  that 
orderly  dispositions  and  industrious  habits  began  generally  to 
prevail,  and  gave  promise  of  lasting  plenty  and  steady  improve 
ment.1  If  we  compare  the  actions  of  Smith,  during  the  period 
of  his  presidency,  with  the  enterprise  that  immediately  preceded 
his  election,  it  may  appear,  at  first  view,  that  the  sphere  of  his 
exertions  was  contracted  and  degraded  by  his  official  elevation  ; 
and  we  might  almost  be  tempted  to  regret  the  returning  reason 
ableness  of  the  colonists,  which,  by  confining  this  active  spirit 
to  the  petty  details  of  their  government,  withdrew  it  from  a 
range  more  congenial  to  its  excursive  vigor,  and  more  fraught 
with  general  advantage  to  mankind.  Yet,  deeper  and  wiser 
reflection  suggests,  that  a  truly  great  mind,  especially  when 
united  with  an  ardent  temper,  will  never  be  contracted  by  the 
seeming  restriction  of  its  sphere,  but  will  always  be  nobly  as 
well  as  usefully  employed,  and  not  the  less  nobly  when  it  dig 
nifies  what  is  ordinary,  and  improves  those  models  that  invite 
the  widest  imitation  and  are  most  level  with  common  oppor 
tunities. 

Accordingly,  when  we  examine  the  history  of  that  year  over 
which  the  official  supremacy  of  Captain  Smith  was  extended, 
and  consider  the  results  of  the  multifarious  details  which  it  em 
braces,2  we  discern  a  dignity  as  real,  though  not  so  glaring,  as 
that  which  invests  his  celebrated  voyage  of  discovery  ;  and  are 
sensible  of  consequences  even  more  interesting  to  human  na 
ture  than  any  which  this  expedition  produced.  In  a  small 
society,  where"  no  great  actual  inequality  of  accommodation 
could  exist,  where  power  derived  no  aid  from  pomp,  circum 
stance,  or  mystery,  and  where  he  owed  his  office  to  the  ap- 

1  Stith.  2  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]  SMITH'S  ADMINISTRATION.  49 

pointment  of  his  associates,  and  held  it  by  the  tenure  of  their 
good-will,1  he  preserved  order  and  enforced  morality  among  a 
crew  of  dissolute  and  disappointed  men  ;  and  so  successfully 
opposed  his  authority  to  the  allurements  of  indolence,  strength 
ened  by  their  previous  habits  and  promoted  by  the  community 
o'f  gains  that  then  prevailed,  as  to  introduce  and  maintain  a 
respectable  degree  of  laborious  and  even  contented  industry. 
What  one  governor  afterwards  achieved,  in  this  respect,  by 
the  influence  of  an  imposing  rank,  and  others  by  the  strong  en 
gine  of  martial  law,  Smith,  without  such  aid,  and  with  greater 
success,  accomplished  by  the  continual  application  of  his  own 
superior  sense  and  his  preeminent  vigor,  fortitude,  and  activity. 
Some  plots  were  formed  against  him  ;  but  these  he  detected 
and  defeated  without  either  straining  or  compromising  his  au 
thority.  The  caprice  and  suspicion  of  the  Indians  involved 
him  in  numberless  trials  of  his  temper  and  capacity.  Even 
Powhatan,  notwithstanding  the  friendly  ties  that  united  him  to 
his  ancient  guest,  was  induced,  by  the  treacherous  artifices  of 
certain  Dutchmen  who  deserted  to  him  from  Jamestown,  first 
to  form  a  secret  conspiracy,  and  then  to  excite  and  prepare  open 
hostility  against  the  colonists.  [1609.]  Some  of  the  fraudful  de 
signs  of  the  royal  savage  were  revealed  by  the  unabated  kind 
ness  of  Pocahontas  ;  others  were  detected  by  Captain  Smith  ; 
and  from  them  all  he  contrived  to  extricate  the  colony  with 
honor  and  success,  and  yet  with  little  and  only  defensive 
bloodshed  ;  displaying  to  the  Indians  a  vigor  and  sagacity  they 
could  neither  overcome  nor  overreach,  a  courage  that  ex 
cited  their  admiration,  and  a  generosity  that  carried  his  vic 
tory  into  their  minds,  and  reconciled  submission  with  their 
pride.  He  was  ever  superior  to  that  political  timidity,  which, 

1  It  was  the  testimony  of  his  soldiers  and  fellow-adventurers,  says  Stith, 
"  that  he  was  ever  fruitful  in  expedients  to  provide  for  the  people  under  his 
command,  whom  he  would  never  suffer  to  want  any  thing  he  either  had  or 
could  procure  ;  that  he  rather  chose  to  lead  than  send  his  soldiers  into  dan 
ger  ;  "  that,  in  all  their  expeditions,  he  partook  the  common  fare,  and  never 
gave  a  command  that  he  was  not  ready  to  execute  ;  "  that  he  would  suffer 
want  rather  than  borrow,  and  starve  sooner  than  not  pay  ;  that  he  had  nothing 
in  him  counterfeit  or  shy,  but  was  open,  honest,  and  sincere."  Stith  adds, 
respecting  this  founder  of  civilized  society  in  North  America,  what  the  son  of 
Columbus  has,  with  a  noble  elation,  recorded  of  his  father,  that,  though  habit 
uated  to  naval  manners,  and  to  the  command  of  factious  and  licentious  men, 
he  never  was  guilty  of  profane  swearing. 

VOL.    I.  7 


50  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

in  circumstances  of  danger,  suggests  not  the  proportionate, 
but  always  the  strongest  and  most  violent,  remedy  and  coun 
teraction  ;  and  admirably  illustrated  the  chief  political  uses  of 
talent  and  virtue,  in  accomplishing  the  objects  of  government 
by  gentler  efforts  and  milder  means  than  stupidity  and  ferocity 
would  have  ventured  to  employ.  In  demonstrating  (to  use  his 
own  words)  "  what  small  cause  there  is  that  men  should 
starve  or  be  murdered  by  the  savages,  that  have  discretion  to 
manage  them  with  courage  and  industry,"  x  he  bequeathed  a 
valuable  lesson  to  his  successors  in  the  American  colonies, 
and  to  all  succeeding  settlers  in  the  vicinity  of  savage  tribes  ; 
and  in  exemplifying  (though,  it  must  be  confessed,  only  for  a 
brief  period  and  on  a  small  scale)  the  power  of  a  civilized 
people  to  anticipate  the  cruel  and  vulgar  issue  of  battle,  and  to 
prevail  over  an  inferior  race  without  either  extirpating  or  en 
slaving  them,  he  obtained  a  victory,  which  Caesar,  with  all  his 
boasted  superiority  to  the  rest  of  mankind,  was  too  ungenerous 
to  appreciate,  or  was  incompetent  to  achieve. 

There  was  one  point,  indeed,  in  which  it  must  be  con 
fessed  that  his  conduct  to  the  Indians  was  chargeable  with 
defect  of  justice  and  good  policy  ;  though  the  blame  of  this 
error  must  be  divided  between  himself  and  the  royal  patentees 
whom  he  served,  and,  in  addition  to  other  palliating  circum 
stances,  was  disguised  by  its  conformity  with  the  universal 
and  unreproved  practice  of  European  settlers  in  barbarous 
lands.  No  part  of  the  territory  which  the  first  colonists  occu 
pied  was  purchased  from  the  rude  tribes  who  considered 
themselves  its  owners,  and  who  probably  at  first  regarded 
with  little  apprehension  the  settlement  of  a  handful  of  strangers 
•  in  a  valueless  corner  of  their  wide  domains.  The  colonists, 
indifferent  to  the  opinion  of  the  Indians,  seem  not  to  have  con 
ceived  that  the  important  right  of  property  in  land  could  be 
derived  from  occasional  visitations  of  savage  hunters,  and  readi 
ly  took,  as  from  the  hands  of  nature,  the  territory  which  ap 
peared  to  them  to  have  been  never  reclaimed  from  its  natural 
wildness  and  vacancy  by  deliberate  occupation  or  industrial 
use.  If  they  had  reasoned  upon  the  matter,  they  would 

1  Smith. 


CHAP.  I.]  NEW  CHARTER.  51 

probably  have  denied  the  right  of  the  Indians  to  defeat  the 
chief  end  of  so  large  a  portion  of  the  earth,  and  restrict  to  an 
ignoble  ministration  to  the  idle  subsistence  of  a  few  barbarians 
the  soil  which  industry  and  virtue  might  render  subservient  to 
the  diffusion  of  civility  and  the  extension  of  life.  But  if  their 
views  had  been  regulated  by  the  same  equity  and  moderation 
which  distinguished  the  later  colonists  of  North  America,  they 
might  have  ascertained  that  their  interests  would  be  at  once 
more  cheaply  and  more  humanely  promoted  by  recognizing 
than  by  disputing  the  pretensions  of  the  Indians  ;  who,  if  they 
claimed  land  by  a  title  which  Europeans  accounted  unworthy 
of  respect,  were  generally  willing  to  part  with  it  for  a  price 
which  Europeans  found  it  very  easy  to  pay.  It  was  reserved 
for  the  Puritan  fathers  of  New  England  to  set  the  first  example 
of  more  liberal  justice,  and  more  impartial  consideration  of  the 
rights  of  mankind  ;  and,  by  a  transaction  in  which  sound  policy 
and  refined  morality  were  happily  blended,  to  mediate  an  ami 
cable  agreement  between  their  own  wants  and  the  claim  which 
the  Indians  asserted  on  the  territorial  resources  of  the  country. 
Captain  Smith  was  not  permitted  to  complete  the  work 
which  he  so  well  began.  His  administration  was  unacceptable 
to  the  company  in  England,  for  the  same  reasons  that  rendered 
it  beneficial  to  the  settlers  in  America.  The  patentees,  very 
little  concerned  about  the  establishment  of  a  happy  and  re 
spectable  community,  had  fondly  counted  on  the  accumulation 
of  sudden  wealth  by  the  discovery  of  a  shorter  passage  than 
was  yet  ascertained  to  the  South  Sea,  or  the  acquisition  of 
territory  replete  with  mines  of  the  precious  metals.  In  these 
hopes  they  were  hitherto  disappointed  ;  and  the  state  of  affairs 
in  the  colony  was  far  from  betokening  even  the  retribution  of 
the  expenditure  which  they  had  already  incurred.  The  pros 
pect  of  a  settled  and  improving  state  of  society  at  Jamestown, 
so  far  from  meeting  their  wishes,  threatened  to  promote  the 
growth  of  habits  and  interests  perfectly  incompatible  with  them. 
Still  hoping,  therefore,  to  realize  their  avaricious  dreams,  they 
conceived  it  necessary  for  this  purpose  to  resume  all  authority 
into  their  own  hands,  and  to  abolish  every  semblance  or  sub 
stance  of  jurisdiction  originating  in  America.1  In  order  to  for- 

1  Smith. 


52  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

tify  their  pretensions,  as  well  as  to  increase  their  funds,  they 
now  courted  the  acquisition  of  additional  associates ;  and, 
having  strengthened  their  interests  by  the  accession  of  some 
persons  of  the  highest  rank  and  influence  in  the  realm,  they 
applied  for  and  obtained  a  new  charter. 

If  the  arbitrary  introduction  of  a  new  charter  [23d  May,  1609] 
proclaimed  an  entire  disregard  of  the  rights  of  the  colonists  who 
had  emigrated  on  the  faith  of  the  original  one,  the  provisions 
peculiar  to  the  new  charter  demonstrated  no  less  plainly  the  in 
tention  of  restricting  the  civil  liberty  of  those  emigrants,  and  in 
creasing  their  dependence  on  the  English  patentees.  The  new 
charter  was  granted  to  twenty-one  peers,  ninety-eight  knights, 
and  a  great  multitude  of  doctors,  esquires,  gentlemen,  merchants, 
and  citizens,  and  sundry  of  the  corporations  of  London,  in  ad 
dition  to  the  former  adventurers  ;  and  the  whole  body  was  in 
corporated  by  the  title  of  "  The  Treasurer  and  Company  of 
Adventurers  of  the  City  of  London  for  the  first  Colony  in 
Virginia."  The  boundaries  of  the  colonial  territory  and  the 
power  of  the  corporation  were  enlarged  ;  the  offices  of  presi 
dent  and  council  in  Virginia  were  abolished  ;  a  new  council 
was  established  in  England,  and  the  company  empowered  to 
fill  all  future  vacancies  in  it  by  election  ;  and  to  this  council 
was  committed  the  power  of  new-modelling  the  magistracy  of 
the  colony,  of  enacting  all  the  laws  that  were  to  have  place  in 
it,  and  nominating  all  the  officers  by  whom  these  laws  were  to 
be  carried  into  execution.  Nevertheless,  was  it  still  formally 
stipulated  that  the  colonists  and  their  posterity  should  retain  all 
the  rights  of  Englishmen.  To  prevent  the  doctrines  of  the 
church  of  Rome  from  gaining  admission  into  the  plantation,  it 
was  announced  that  no  persons  would  be  allowed  to  settle 
in  Virginia  without  having  previously  taken  the  oath  of  su 
premacy.1 

The  new  council  appointed  Lord  Delaware  governor  and 
captain-general  of  the  colony  ;  and  the  hopes,  inspired  by  the 
distinguished  rank  and  respectable  character  of  this  nobleman, 
contributed  to  strengthen  the  company  by  a  considerable  ac 
cession  of  funds  and  associates.  Availing  themselves  of  the 
favorable  disposition  of  the  public,  they  equipped  without  loss 

1  Stith.    Hazard. 


CHAP.  I.]     LORD  DELAWARE  APPOINTED   GOVERNOR.         53 

of  time  a  squadron  of  nine  ships,  and  despatched  them  with 
five  hundred  emigrants,  under  the  command  of  Captain  New 
port,  who  was  authorized  to  supersede  the  existing  adminis 
tration,  and  to  govern  the  colony  till  the  arrival  of  Lord  Dela 
ware  with  the  remainder  of  the  recruits  and  supplies.  But  by 
an  unlucky  combination  of  caution  and  indiscretion,  the  same 
powers  were  severally  intrusted  to  Sir  Thomas  Gates  and  Sir 
George  Somers,  without  any  adjustment  of  precedence  be 
tween  the  three  functionaries  ;  and  they,  finding  themselves 
unable  to  settle  this  point  among  themselves,  agreed  to  embark 
on  board  the  same  vessel,  and  to  be  companions  during  the 
voyage, — thus  deliberately  provoking  and  eventually  producing 
the  disappointment  of  the  main  object  which  their  association 
in  authority  was  intended  to  secure.  The  vessel  that  con 
tained  the  triumvirate  was  separated  from  the  fleet  by  a  storm, 
and  stranded  on  the  coast  of  Bermudas.1  The  residue  of  the 
squadron  arrived  safely  at  Jamestown  ;.  but  so  little  were  they 
expected,  that,  when  they  were  first  descried  at  sea,  they 
were  mistaken  for  enemies  ;  and  this  rumor  gave  occasion  to 
a  very  satisfactory  proof  of  the  friendly  disposition  of  the  In 
dians,  who  came  forward  with  the  utmost  alacrity,  and  offered 
to  fight  in  defence  of  the  colony.2 

These  apprehensions,  which  were  dissipated  by  the  nearer 
approach  of  the  fleet,  gave  place  to  more  substantial  and  more 
formidable  evils,  arising  from  the  composition  of  the  reinforce 
ment  which  it  brought  to  the  colonial  community.  A  great 
proportion  of  the  new  emigrants  consisted  of  profligate  and 
licentious  youths,  sent  from  England  by  their  friends  with  the 
hope  of  changing  their  destinies,  or  for  the  purpose  of  screen- 

1  It  was  probably  this  disaster  which  produced  the  only  mention  of  the 
American    regions  which  we  find  in  the  works   of  Shakspeare.      In    The 
Tempest,  which    was  composed    about  three  years  after  this  period,  Ariel 
celebrates  the  stormy  coast  of  "  the  still  vexed  Bermudas."     An  allusion  to 
the  British  settlements  in  America  is  couched  in  the  prophecy  which  Shak 
speare,  in  the  last  scene  of  King  Henry  the  Eighth,  imputes  to  Cranmer  re 
specting  King  James,  —  that, 

"  Wherever  the  bright  sun  of  heaven  shall  shine, 
His  honor  and  the  greatness  of  his  name 
Shall  be,  and  make  new  nations." 

Milton,  I  believe,  has  never  mentioned  America,  except  in  his  casual  allu 
sion  (Paradise  Lost,  B.  IX.)  to  the  condition  of  the  Indians  when  they  were 
first  visited  by  Columbus. 

2  Smith.     Stith. 


54  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ing  them  from  the  »justice  or  contempt  of  their  country  ;  of  in 
digent  gentlemen,  too  proud  to  beg,  and  too  lazy  to  work  ; 
tradesmen  of  broken  fortunes  and  broken  spirit ;  idle  retainers, 
of  whom  the  great  were  eager  to  rid  themselves  ;  and  de 
pendents  too  infamous  to  be  decently  protected  at  home  ; 
with  others,  like  these,  more  likely  to  corrupt  and  prey  upon 
an  infant  commonwealth  than  to  improve  or  sustain  it.1  The 
leaders  of  this  pernicious  crew,  though  devoid  of  legal  docu 
ments  entitling  them  to  supersede  the  existing  authority,  pro 
claimed  the  changes  which  the  constitution  of  the  colony  had 
undergone,  and  hastened  to  execute  that  part  of  the  innovation 
which  consisted  in  the  overthrow  of  the  provincial  presidency 
and  council.  Their  conduct  soon  demonstrated  that  their  title 
to  assume  authority  was  not  more  defective  than  their  capacity 
to  exercise  it.  Assuming  supreme  jurisdiction,  they  were  unable 
to  devise  any  frame  of  government,  or  establish  even  among 
themselves  any  fixed  subordination  ;  sometimes  the  old  com 
mission  was  resorted  to  ;  sometimes  a  new  model  attempted  ; 
and  the  chief  direction  of  affairs  passed  from  hand  to  hand  in 
one  uninterrupted  succession  of  folly  and  presumption.  The 
whole  colony  was  thrown  into  confusion  by  the  revolutionary 
state  of  its  government ;  and  the  Indian  tribes  were  alienated 
and  exasperated  by  the  turbulence,  injustice,  and  insolence  of 
the  new  settlers. 

This  emergency  summoned  the  man,  who  had  already  more 
than  once  rescued  the  settlement  from  ruin,  again  to  attempt 
its  deliverance.  The  call  was  seconded  by  the  wishes  of  the 
best  and  wisest  of  the  colonists  ;  and,  aided  as  much  by  the 
vigor  of  his  own  character  as  by  the  cooperation  of  these  indi 
viduals,  Smith  reassumed  his  natural  ascendant  and  official  su 
premacy,  and  declared  his  intention  of  retaining  the  authority 
created  by  the  old  commission,  till  a  legal  revocation  of  it  and 
legitimate  successors  to  himself  should  arrive.  With  a  deter 
mined  vigor  of  purpose,  to  which  instant  acquiescence  was 
yielded,  he  imprisoned  the  chief  promoters  of  tumult  ;  and, 
having  restored  order  and  obedience,  endeavoured  to  prevent 
a  recurrence  of  the  former  mischiefs  by  detaching  from  James- 

1  Stith. 


CHAP.  I.]  SMITH'S  RETURN  TO   ENGLAND.  55 

town  a  portion  of  the  new  colonists  to  form  a  subordinate  set 
tlement  at  some  distance  from  this  place.  This  was  an  un 
fortunate  step  ;  and  it  is  remarkable  that  the  only  signal  failing 
in  the  policy  of  this  eminent  commander  was  evinced  in  the 
only  instance  in  which  he  seemed  to  distrust  his  own  vigor  and 
capacity.  The  detachments  which  he  removed  from  James 
town  conducted  themselves  so  imprudently  as  to  convert  all 
the  neighbouring  Indians  into  enemies,  and  to  involve  them 
selves  in  continual  difficulty  and  danger.  The  Indians  assailed 
him  with  complaints  ;  the  detached  settlers  with  requisitions  of 
counsel  and  assistance  ;  and  Smith,  who  never  spent  in  la 
menting  misfortunes  the  time  that  might  be  employed  in  repair 
ing  them,  was  exerting  himself  with  his  usual  activity  and  good 
sense  in  redressing  these  disorders,  when  he  received  a  dan 
gerous  wound  from  the  accidental  explosion  of  a  mass  of  gun 
powder.  Completely  disabled  by  this  misfortune,  and  desti 
tute  of  surgical  aid  in  the  colony,  he  was  compelled  to  resign 
his  command,  and  take  his  departure  for  England.1  [Oct.  1609.] 
He  never  returned  to  Virginia  again.  It  was  natural  that  he 
should  abandon  with  regret  the  society  which  he  had  exerted  so 
much  admirable  vigor  to  preserve,  —  the  settlement  which  he 
had  conducted  through  difficulties  as  formidable  as  those  which 
obstructed  the  infant  progress  of  Carthage  or  Rome,  —  and  the 
scenes  which  he  had  dignified  by  so  much  wisdom  and  virtue. 
But  our  sympathy  with  his  regret  is  abated  by  the  reflection, 
that  a  longer  residence  in  the  colony  would  speedily  have  con 
signed  him  to  very  subordinate  office,2  and  might  have  deprived 
the  world  of  that  stock  of  valuable  knowledge,  and  his  own 
character  of  that  accession  of  fame,3  which  the  publication  of 
his  travels  has  secured  and  perpetuated. 

1  Smith.     Stith. 

2  See  Note  II.,  at  the  end  of  this  volume. 

3  He  became  so  famous  in  England  before  his  death,  that  his  adventures 
were  dramatized  and  represented  on  the  stage,  to  his  own  great  annoyance. 
Stith. 


56  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 


CHAPTER    II. 

The  Colony  a  Prey  to  Anarchy  —  and  Famine.  —  Gates  and  Somers  arrive  from 
Bermudas.  —  Abandonment  of  the  Colony  determined  upon  —  prevented 
by  the  Arrival  of  Lord  Delaware.  —  His  wise  Administration  —  his  Return 
to  England.  —  Sir  Thomas  Dale's  Administration.  —  Martial  Law  estab 
lished. —  Indian  Chief's  Daughter  seized  by  Argal  —  married  to  Rolfe. — 
Right  of  private  Property  in  Land  introduced  into  the  Colony.  —  Expedition 
of  Argal  against  Port  Royal  and  New  York.  —  Tobacco  cultivated  by  the 
Colonists.  —  First  Assembly  of  Representatives  convened  in  Virginia.  — 
New  Constitution  of  the  Colony. —  Introduction  of  Negro  Slavery.  —  Migra 
tion  of  young  Women  from  England  to  Virginia.  —  Dispute  between  the 
King  and  the  Colony.  —  Conspiracy  of  the  Indians.  —  Massacre  of  the  Col 
onists.  —  Dissensions  of  the  London  Company.  —  The  Company  dissolved. 
—  The  King  assumes  the  Government  of  the  Colony  —  his  Death.  —  Charles 
the  First  pursues  his  Father's  arbitrary  Policy.  —  Tyrannical  Government 
of  Sir  John  Harvey.  —  Sir  William  Berkeley  appointed  Governor.  —  The 
provincial  Liberties  restored.  —  Virginia  espouses  the  royal  Cause  —  sub 
dued  by  the  Long  Parliament.  —  Restraints  imposed  on  the  Trade  of  the 
Colony.  —  Revolt  of  the  Colony. —  Sir  William  Berkeley  resumes  the  Gov 
ernment. —  Restoration  of  Charles  the  Second. 

AT  the  period  of  Smith's  departure,  the  infant  common 
wealth  was  composed  of  five  hundred  persons,  and  amply  pro 
vided  with  all  necessary  stores  of  arms,  provisions,  cattle,  and 
implements  of  agriculture  ; :  hut  the  sense  to  improve  its  op 
portunities  was  wanting  ;  and  fortune  forsook  it  along  with  its 
preserver.  For  a  short  time,  the  government  was  administered 
by  George  Percy,  a  man  of  sense  and  probity,  but  devoid 
of  the  vigor  that  gives  efficacy  to  virtue  ;  and  the  direction  of 
affairs  soon  relapsed  into  the  same  mischievous  channel  from 
which  Smith  had  recalled  it.  The  colony  was  delivered  up  to 
the  wantonness  of  a  giddy  and  distracted  rabble,  and  presented 
a  scene  of  riot,  folly,  and  profligacy,  strongly  invoking  vindic 
tive  retribution,  and  speedily  overtaken  by  it.  The  magazines 
of  food  were  exhausted  with  reckless  improvidence  ;  and  the 

1  Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]  ABANDONMENT  OF  JAMESTOWN.  57 

Indians,  incensed  by  repeated  injuries,  and  aware  that  the  man 
whom  they  so  much  respected  had  ceased  to  govern  the  col 
onists,  not  only  refused  them  all  assistance,  but  harassed  them 
with  continual  hostilities.  Famine  ensued,  and  completed  their 
wretchedness  and  degradation  by  transforming  them  into  canni 
bals,  and  compelling  them  to  support  their  lives  by  feeding  on 
the  bodies  of  the  Indians  whom  they  slew,  and  of  their  own 
companions  who  perished  of  hunger  or  disease.  Six  months 
after  the  departure  of  Smith,  there  remained  no  more  than 
sixty  persons  alive  at  Jamestown,  still  prolonging  their  mis 
ery  by  a  vile  and  precarious  diet,  but  daily  expecting  its  final 
and  fatal  close.1 

In  this  wretched  predicament  was  the  colony  found  by  Gates, 
Somers,  and  Newport,  who  at  length  arrived  from  Bermudas 
[May,  1610],  where  the  shipwreck  they  encountered  had  de 
tained  them  and  their  crew  for  ten  months.2  The  bounty  of  na 
ture  in  that  happy  region  maintained  them  in  comfort  while  they 
constructed  the  vessels  that  were  to  transport  them  to  James 
town,  and  might  have  supplied  them  with  ample  stores  for  the 
use  of  the  colony  ;  but  they  neglected  these  resources,  and 
arrived  almost  empty-handed,  in  the  confident  assurance  of 
receiving  from  the  magazines  of  a  thriving  settlement  the  relief 
that  was  now  vainly  implored  from  themselves  by  the  famish 
ing  remnant  of  their  countrymen.  Their  disappointment  was 
equalled  only  by  the  difficulty  of  ascertaining,  amidst  the  mu 
tual  and  contradictory  accusations  of  the  surviving  colonists, 
how  or  by  whose  fault  a  calamity  so  unexpected  had  actually 
come  to  pass.  But  there  was  no  time  for  deliberate  inquiry, 
or  adjustment  of  complaints.  It  was  determined  to  abandon 
the  settlement  ;  and  with  this  view  all  the  people  embarked  in 
the  vessels  that  had  arrived  from  Bermudas,  and  set  sail  for 
England.  Their  stores  were  insufficient  for  so  long  a  voyage ; 
but  they  hoped  to  obtain  an  additional  supply  at  the  English 
fishing  station  on  the  coast  of  Newfoundland.  Such  abhor 
rence  of  the  scene  of  their  misery  was  entertained  by  some  of 
the  colonists,  that  they  importuned  the  commanders  to  burn 
the  fort  and  houses  at  Jamestown.  But  Gates  could  not 
discern  in  their  or  his  own  distresses  any  reason  for  demolish- 

1  Stith.  *  Smith. 

VOL.    I.  8 


58  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ing  the  buildings,  that  might  afford  shelter  to  future  settlers  ; 
and  happily,  by  his  interposition,  the  edifices  were  preserved 
from  destruction,  and  the  colonists  prevented  from  wreaking 
additional  vengeance  on  themselves.1 

For  it  was  not  the  will  of  Providence  that  this  little  com 
monwealth  should  perish  ;  the  calamities  with  which  it  had 
been  visited  were  appointed  to  punish  merely,  but  not  entirely 
to  destroy  ;  and  the  most  vicious  members  being  now  cut  off, 
and  a  memorable  lesson  afforded  both  to  the  patrons  who  col 
lect  2  and  the  persons  who  compose  such  communities,  a  de 
liverance  no  less  signal  was  vouchsafed  by  the  Disposer  of  all 
events,  just  when  hope  was  over,  and  the  colony  advanced  to 
the  very  brink  of  annihilation.  Before  the  fugitives  had  reached 
the  mouth  of  James  River,  they  were  met  by  Lord  Delaware, 
who  arrived  with  three  ships,  containing  a  large  supply  of  pro 
visions,  a  considerable  number  of  new  settlers,  and  an  ample 
stock  of  every  implement  and  commodity  requisite  for  defence 
or  cultivation.3 

Lord  Delaware,  who  now  presented  himself  a's  captain- 
general  of  the  colony,  was  singularly  well  fitted  for  the  exi 
gency  of  the  predicament  in  which  he  was  thus  unexpectedly 
placed.  To  an  ancient  lineage  and  a  title  of  nobility,  in  an 
age  when  such  distinctions  were  regarded  with  much  venera 
tion,  he  joined  a  dignified  demeanour,  a  disinterested  charac 
ter,  respectable  sense,  and  a  firm  and  resolute  temper.  The 
hope  of  rendering  an  important  service  to  his  country,  and  the 
generous  pleasure  of  cooperating  in  a  great  design,  had  in 
duced  him  to  exchange  ease  and  splendor  at  home  for  a  situa 
tion  of  the  general  difficulties  of  which  he  was  perfectly  aware ; 
and  the  same  firmness  and  elevation  of  purpose  preserved  him 
undaunted  and  unperplexed  by  the  astounding  scene  of  calamity 

1  Smith.     Stith. 

8  The  fate  of  this  settlement  probably  suggested  to  Lord  Bacon  the  follow 
ing  passage  in  his  Essay  on  Plantations.  "  It  is  a  shameful  and  unblessed 
thing  to  take  the  scum  of  the  people,  and  wicked,  condemned  men,  to  be  the 
people  with  whom  we  plant ;  and  not  only  so,  but  it  spoileth  the  plantation  ; 
for  they  will  ever  live  like  rogues  and  not  fall  to  work,  but  be  lazy  and  do 
mischief  and  spend  victuals."  Britain  boasts  the  honor  of  producing  two  such 
philosophers  and  teachers  of  colonial  policy  as  Lord  Bacon  and  Adam  Smith, 
but  cannot  claim  the  higher  honor  of  having  appreciated  and  followed  their 
counsels. 

3  Smith.     Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]     ADMINISTRATION   OF  LORD  DELAWARE.  59 

which  he  encountered  on  his  arrival  in  Virginia.  Stemming 
the  torrent  of  evil  fortune,  he  carried  back  the  fugitives  to 
Jamestown,  and  commenced  his  administration  by  attendance 
on  divine  worship.  After  some  consultation  respecting  the 
affairs  of  the  settlement,  he  summoned  all  the  colonists  to 
gether,  and  addressed  them  in  a  short,  but  judicious  and  im 
pressive  harangue.  [1611.]  He  rebuked  the  folly,  sloth,  and  im 
morality  that  had  produced  such  disasters,  and  recommended 
a  return  to  the  virtues  most  likely  to  repair  them  ;  he  declared 
his  determination  not  to  hold  the  sword  of  justice  in  vain,  but 
to  punish  the  first  recurrence  of  disorder  by  shedding  the  blood 
of  the  delinquents,  —  though  he  would  infinitely  rather  (he 
protested)  shed  his  own  to  protect  the  colony  from  injury. 
He  nominated  proper  officers  for  every  department  of  the  pub 
lic  service,  and  allotted  to  every  man  his  particular  station  and 
business.  This  address  was  received  with  general  applause 
and  satisfaction ;  and  the  factious  humors  of  the  people  seemed 
readily  and  entirely  to  subside  beneath  the  dignity  and  the  pru 
dent  and  resolute  policy  of  Lord  Delaware's  administration. 
The  deference  which  had  been  reluctantly  extorted  by  the 
superior  talent  and  genius  of  Smith  was  more  willingly  yielded 
to  claims  of  superior  birth  and  hereditary  elevation,  more  pal 
pable  to  the  apprehension,  and  less  offensive  to  the  self-com 
placency,  of  the  mass  of  mankind.  By  an  assiduous  attention 
to  his  duty,  and  a  happy  union  of  qualities  fitted  equally  to 
inspire  esteem  and  command  submission,  Lord  Delaware  suc 
ceeded  in  maintaining  peace  and  good  order  within  the  settle 
ment,  in  awakening  a  spirit  of  industry  and  alacrity  among 
the  colonists,  and  in  again  impressing  the  dread  and  rever 
ence  of  the  English  name  on  the  minds  of  the  Indians.  This 
promising  beginning  was  ah1  that  he  was  permitted  to  accom 
plish.  Oppressed  by  disease  occasioned  by  the  climate,  he 
was  compelled  to  quit  the  country  ;  having  first  committed  the 
administration  of  his  authority  to  George  Percy.1 

The  restoration  of  Percy  [March,  1611]  to  the  official  dignity 
which  he  had  once  before  enjoyed  was  attended  with  the  same 
relaxation  of  discipline,  and  would  probably  have  issued  in  a 

1  Stith.     Lord  Delaware's  Discourse,  apud  Smith. 


60  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

repetition  of  the  same  disorders  that  so  fatally  distinguished  his 
former  presidency.  But,  happily  for  the  colony,  a  squadron 
that  had  been  despatched  from  England,  before  Lord  Dela 
ware's  return,  with  a  supply  of  men  and  provisions,  brought  also 
with  it  Sir  Thomas  Dale,  whose  commission  authorized  him,  in 
the  absence  of  that  nobleman,  to  assume  the  chief  command. 
[May,  1611.]  This  new  governor  found  the  colonists  fast  relaps 
ing  into  idleness  and  penury  ;  and  though  he  exerted  himself 
strenuously,  and  not  unsuccessfully,  to  restore  better  habits, 
yet  the  loss  of  Lord  Delaware's  imposing  rank  and  authoritative 
character  was  sensibly  felt.  What  Dale  could  not  accomplish 
by  milder  means,  he  was  soon  enabled  to  produce  by  a  system 
of  notable  rigor  and  severity.  A  code  of  rules  had  been  com 
piled  by  Sir  Thomas  Smith,  the  treasurer  of  the  company  of 
patentees,  from  the  martial  law  of  the  Low  Countries,  the  most 
severe  and  arbitrary  frame  of  discipline  then  subsisting  in  the 
world  ;  and  having  been  printed  by  the  compiler  for  the  use 
of  the  colony,  but  without  the  sanction  or  authority  of  the  coun 
cil,  was  transmitted  by  him  to  the  governor.1  This  code  did 
not  long  remain  inoperative.  Dale  caused  it  to  be  proclaimed 
as  the  established  law  of  the  colony  ;  and  some  conspiracies 
having  broken  out,  he  administered  its  provisions  with  great 
rigor,  but  not  greater  than  was  judged  by  all  who  witnessed 
it  to  have  been  requisite  for  the  general  safety.  The  wisdom 
and  honor  of  the  governor,  who  thus  became  the  first  deposi 
tary  of  those  formidable  powrers,  and  the  salutary  consequences 
that  resulted  from  the  first  exercise  of  them,  prevented  the 
alarm  which  the  introduction  of  a  system  so  arbitrary  and  des 
potic  was  calculated  to  provoke.  Dale  was  succeeded  in  the 
supreme  command  by  Sir  Thomas  Gates  [August,  1611],  who 
arrived  with  six  vessels,  containing  a  powerful  reinforcement  to 
the  numbers  and  resources  of  the  colonists.  The  late  and  the 
present  governor  were  united  by  mutual  friendship  and  similarity 
of  character.  Gates  approved  and  pursued  the  system  of  strict 
discipline,  and  steady,  but  moderate,  execution  of  the  martial 

1  Stith.  Nothing  can  be  more  fanciful  or  erroneous  than  Dr.  Robertson's 
account  of  the  introduction  of  this  system,  which,  without  the  slightest  au 
thority,  he  ascribes  to  the  advice  of  Lord  Bacon,  and,  in  opposition  to  all 
evidence,  represents  as  the  act  of  the  company.  See  Note  III.,  at  the  end  of 
the  volume. 


CHAP.  II.]  NEW  CHARTER.  — LOTTERY.  61 

code  introduced  by  Dale  ;  and  under  the  directions  of  Dale, 
who  remained  in  the  country  and  cheerfully  occupied  a  subor 
dinate  station,  various  detached  parties  of  the  colonists  began 
to  form  additional  settlements  on  the  banks  of  James  River, 
and  at  some  distance  from  Jamestown.1 

An  application  was  now  made  by  the  company  of  patentees 
to  the  king,  for  an  enlargement  of  their  territory  and  jurisdic 
tion.  The  accounts  they  received  from  the  persons  who  were 
shipwrecked  on  Bermudas,  of  the  fertility  and  convenience  of 
this  region,  impressed  them  with  the  desire  of  obtaining  posses 
sion  of  its  resources  for  the  benefit  of  Virginia.2  Their  request 
was  granted  without  difficulty  ;  and  a  new  charter  was  issued 
[March,  1612] ,  investing  them  with  all  the  islands  situated  within 
three  hundred  leagues  of  the  Virginian  coast.  Some  innovations 
were  made,  at  the  same  time,  in  the  structure  and  forms  of  the 
corporation  ;  the  term  of  exemption  from  customs  was  pro 
longed  ;  the  company  was  empowered  to  apprehend  and  re 
mand  persons  deserting  the  settlement,  in  violation  of  their  en 
gagements  ;  and  in  order  to  promote  the  advancement  of  the 
colony  and  the  reimbursement  of  the  large  sums  that  had  been 
expended  on  it,  license  was  granted  to  open  lotteries  in  any 
part  of  England.  The  lottery  which  was  established  in  virtue 
of  this  license  was  the  first  institution  of  the  kind  that  ever 
received  public  countenance  in  England  ;  it  brought  twenty- 
nine  thousand  pounds  into  the  treasury  of  the  company,  but 
loaded  this  body  with  the  reproach  of  defrauding  the  English 
people  and  corrupting  their  manners.  The  House  of  Com 
mons  remonstrated  against  the  permission  of  the  lottery,  as  a 
measure  equally  unconstitutional  and  impolitic  ;  and  the  license 
was  shortly  after  recalled.  Happy  if  their  example  had  been 
sooner  copied  by  after  ages,  and  the  rulers  of  mankind  re 
strained  from  polluting  their  financial  administration  by  a  system 
of  chicane,  promoting  in  their  subjects  those  gambling  tastes 
and  habits  which  dissolve  industry  and  virtue  and  frequently 
beget  even  the  most  atrocious  crimes  !  Notwithstanding  the 

1  Smith.     Stith. 

2  Stith.     About  this  time,  the  patentees  promoted  a  subscription  among  de 
vout  persons  in  London  for  building  churches  in  the  colony ;  but  the  money 
was  Diverted  to  other  purposes ;  and  it  was  not  till  some  years  after,  that 
churches  were  built  in  Virginia.  —  Oldmixon. 


62  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

eagerness  of  the  company  to  acquire  the  Bermuda  Islands, 
they  did  not  long  retain  this  territory,  but  sold  it  to  a  junto  of 
their  own  associates,  who  were  united  by  royal  charter  into  a 
separate  corporation,  named  the  Somer  Islands  Company.1 

The  colony  of  Virginia  had  once  been  saved,  in  the  person 
of  its  own  deliverer,  Captain  Smith,  by  Pocahontas,  the  daugh 
ter  of  the  Indian  king,  Powhatan.  This  princess  maintained 
ever  since  a  friendly  intercourse  with  the  English,  and  was 
destined  now  again  to  render  them  a  service  of  the  highest 
importance.  A  scarcity  prevailing  at  Jamestown,  and  supplies 
being  obtained  but  scantily  and  irregularly  from  the  neighbour 
ing  Indians,  with  whom  the  colonists  were  often  embroiled, 
Captain  Argal  was  despatched  to  the  shores  of  the  river  Po 
tomac  in  quest  of  a  cargo  of  corn.  Here  he  learned  that 
Pocahontas  was  living  in  retirement  at  no  great  distance  from 
him  ;  and  hoping,  by  possession  of  her  person,  to  obtain  such 
an  ascendant  over  Powhatan  as  would  insure  an  ample  contri 
bution  of  provisions,  he  prevailed  on  her,  by  some  artifice,  to 
come  on  board  his  vessel,  and  then  set  sail  with  her  to  James 
town,  where  she  was  detained  in  captivity,  though  treated  with 
ceremonious  respect.  But  Powhatan,  (who,  like  many  Indian 
chiefs,  though  devoid  of  steady,  generous  wisdom,  yet  pos 
sessed  a  wild,  uncultivated  virtue,)  more  indignant  at  such 
treachery  than  subdued  by  his  misfortune,  rejected  with  scorn 
the  demand  of  a  ransom  ;  he  even  refused  to  hold  any  communi 
cation  with  the  pirates  who  still  kept  his  daughter  a  prisoner  ; 2 
declaring,  nevertheless,  that,  if  she  were  restored  to  him,  he 
would  forget  the  injury,  and,  feeling  himself  at  liberty  to  regard 
the  authors  of  it  as  friends,  would  gratify  all  their  wishes. 
The  colonists,  however,  were  too  conscious  of  not  deserving 
the  performance  of  such  promises,  to  be  able  to  give  credit  to 
them  ;  and  the  most  injurious  consequences  seemed  likely  to 
arise  from  an  unjust  detention,  which  they  could  no  longer 
continue  with  advantage,  nor  relinquish  with  safety,  —  when, 
behold  !  all  at  once  the  aspect  of  affairs  underwent  a  happy 
and  surprising  change.  During  her  residence  in  the  colony, 

1  Stith.     Chalmer's  Jlnnals. 

2  He  would  not  deem 

"  The  soil  of  her  fair  rape 
Wiped  off  in  honorable  keeping  her." 
^  Shakspeare. 


CHAP.  II.]  MARRIAGE   OF  POCAHONTAS.  63 

Pocahontas,  whose  pleasing  manners  and  other  personal  attrac 
tions  have  been  celebrated  with  warm  commendation,  gained 
the  affections  of  a  young  man  named  Rolfe,  a  person  of  rank 
and  estimation  among  the  planters,  who  offered  her  his  hand, 
and,  with  her  approbation  and  the  cordial  encouragement  of  the 
governor,  solicited  the  consent  of  Powhatan  to  their  marriage. 
This  the  old  prince  readily  bestowed,  and  despatched  certain 
of  his  relatives  to  attend  the  ceremonial,  which  was  performed 
with  extraordinary  pomp  [April,  1613],  and  laid  the  founda 
tion  of  a  firm  and  sincere  friendship  between  his  tribe  and  the 
English.  This  fortunate  event  also  enabled  the  provincial  gov 
ernment  to  conclude  a  treaty  with  the  Chickahominies,  a  horde 
distinguished  by  their  bravery  and  their  military  experience, 
who  consented  to  acknowledge  themselves  subjects  of  the  Brit 
ish  monarch,  and  to  style  themselves  henceforward  Englishmen, 
—  to  assist  the  colonists  with  their  arms  in  war,  and  to  pay  an 
annual  tribute  of  Indian  corn. 

But  a  material  change,  which  now  took  place  in  the  social 
structure  of  the  colony,  contributed  to  fix  its  prosperity  on 
foundations  more  solid  and  respectable  than  the  alliance  or 
dependence  of  the  Indian  tribes.  The  industry,  which  had 
been  barely  kept  alive  by  the  severe  discipline  of  martial  law, 
languished  under  the  discouraging  influence  of  that  community 
of  property  and  acquisition  which  was  introduced,  as  we  have 
seen,  by  the  provisions  of  the  original  charter.  As  a  temporary 
expedient,  this  system  could  not  have  been  easily  avoided  ; 
and  the  censure  which  historians  have  so  readily  bestowed  on 
its  introduction  seems  to  be  far  from  reasonable.  The  real 
impolicy  consisted  in  prolonging  its  duration  beyond  the  time 
when  the  colony  acquired  stability,  when  modes  and  habits 
of  life  were  fixed,  and  when,  the  resources  of  the  territory 
and  the  productive  powers  of  labor  being  fully  understood,  the 
government  might  safely  and  beneficially  have  remitted  every 
individual  to  the  stimulus  of  his  own  interest  and  dependence 
on  his  own  exertions.  But  in  the  outset,  it  was  necessary,  or 
at  least  highly  expedient,  that  the  government  should  charge 
itself  with  the  support  of  its  subjects  and  the  regulation  of  their 
industry  ;  and  that  their  first  experimental  exertions  should  be 
referred  and  adapted  to  the  principle  and  governance  of  a  sys- 


64  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

tern  of  partnership.  How  long  such  a  system  may  endure, 
when  originated  and  maintained  by  a  strong  and  general  im 
pulse  of  that  Christian  spirit  which  directs  every  man  to  regard 
his  office  on  earth  as  a  trust,  his  life  as  a  stewardship,  and  the 
superiority  of  his  faculties  and  advantages  as  designating,  not 
the  enlargement  of  his  privileges,  but  the  extent  of  his  re 
sponsibility,  is  a  problem  to  be  solved  by  the  future  history  of 
mankind.  But  as  a  permanent  arrangement,  supported  only 
by  municipal  law,  it  attempts  an  impossibility,  and  commits  its 
practical  administration  to  an  influence  destructive  of  its  own 
principles.  As  soon  as  the  sense  of  individual  interest  and 
security  begins  to  dissolve  the  bond  of  common  hazard,  dan 
ger,  and  difficulty,  the  law  is  felt  to  be  an  irksome  and  inju 
rious  restriction  ;  but  as  in  theory  it  retains  a  generous  as 
pect,  and  the  first  symptoms  of  its  practical  inconvenience  are 
the  idleness  and  immorality  promoted  by  its  secret  suggestions, 
it  is  not  surprising  that  rulers  should  seek  to  remove  the  effect, 
while  they  preserve  the  cause,  and  even  by  additional  severi 
ties  of  regulation  extinguish  every  remains  of  the  virtue  which 
they  vainly  attempt  to  rekindle. 

Sir  Thomas  Dale,  by  his  descent  from  the  supreme  direc 
tion  of  affairs  to  a  more  active  participation  in  the  conduct  of 
them,  was  enabled  to  discern  with  accurate  and  unprejudiced 
observation  the  influence  of  the  provincial  laws  on  the  dispo 
sitions  of  the  colonists  ;  and  soon  discovered  the  violent  re 
pugnance  between  a  system  which  enforced  community  of 
property,  and  all  the  ordinary  motives  by  which  human  industry 
is  sustained.  He  saw  that  every  one  was  eager  to  evade  or 
abridge  his  own  share  of  labor  ;  that  the  universal  reliance  on 
the  common  stock  impaired,  universally,  the  diligence  and  ac 
tivity  on  which  the  accumulation  of  that  stock  depended  ;  that 
the  slothful  trusted  to  the  exertions  of  the  industrious,  while 
the  industrious  were  deprived  of  alacrity  by  impatience  of  sup 
porting  and  confirming  the  slothful  in  their  idleness  ;  and  that 
the  most  conscientious  citizen  would  hardly  perform  as  much 
labor  for  the  community  in  a  week  as  he  would  for  himself  in 
a  day.  Under  Dale's  direction,  the  evil  was  redressed  by  a 
radical  and  effectual  remedy  :  a  sufficient  portion  of  land  was 
divided  into  lots,  and  one  of  them  was  appropriated  to  every 


CHAP.  II.]  ATTACK  ON  PORT  ROYAL.  65 

settler.  From  that  moment,  industry,  freed  from  the  obstruc 
tion  that  had  relaxed  its  incitements  and  intercepted  its  recom 
pense,  took  vigorous  root  in  Virginia,  and  the  prosperity  of 
the  colony  experienced  a  steady  and  rapid  advancement.1 
Gates  returning  to  England  [1614],  the  supreme  direction 
again  devolved  on  Sir  Thomas  Dale,  whose  virtue  seems 
never  to  have  enlarged  with  the  extension  of  his  authority. 
He  retained  for  two  years  longer  the  governance  of  the  colo 
ny,  and  in  his  domestic  administration  continued  to  promote 
its  real  welfare  ;  but  he  launched  into  foreign  operations  little 
productive  of  advantage,  and  still  less  of  honor.  In  Captain 
Argal,  the  author  of  the  flagitious  but  fortunate  abduction  of 
Pocahontas,  he  found  a  fit  instrument,  and  perhaps  a  coun 
sellor,  of  designs  of  a  similar  character. 

The  French  settlers  in  Acadia  had,  in  the  year  1605,  built 
Port  Royal,  in  the  Bay  of  Fundy,  and  ever  since  retained 
quiet  possession  of  the  adjacent  country,  and  successfully  cul 
tivated  a  friendly  intercourse  with  the  neighbouring  Indians. 
Under  the  pretext,  that  the  French,  by  settling  in  Acadia,  in 
vaded  the  rights  which  the  English  derived  from  prior  discov 
ery  of  the  continent,  was  Argal  despatched,  in  a  season  of 
profound  peace,  to  make  a  hostile  attack  on  Port  Royal. 
Nothing  could  be  more  unjust  or  unwarranted  than  this  enter 
prise.  The  Virginian  charters,  with  the  protection  of  which 
alone  Sir  Thomas  Dale  was  intrusted,  did  not  embrace  the 
territory  which  he  now  presumed  to  invade,  and  which  the 
French  had  peaceably  possessed  for  nearly  ten  years  in  virtue 
of  charters  from  their  sovereign,  Henry  the  Fourth.  Argal 
easily  succeeded  in  surprising  and  plundering  a  community  to 
tally  unsuspicious  of  hostility  and  unprepared  for  defence  ; 
but  as  he  established  no  garrison  in  the  place,  the  French 
soon  resumed  their  station  ; 2  and  the  expedition  produced  no 
other  permanent  effect  than  the  indignant  recollections  it  left  in 
the  minds  of  the  French,  and  the  unfavorable  impression  it 
produced  on  the  Indians.  Returning  from  this  expedition, 

1  Smith.     Stith. 

2  Stith.     Escarbot's  History  of  New   France.     Purchas.     Argal's  piratical 
attack  on  Port  Royal  was  revenged  by  the  French  on  Captain  Smith  in  the 
following  year.     See  Book  II.  Chap.  I.  post. 

VOL.     I.  9 


66  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

Argal  undertook  and  achieved  a  similar  enterprise  against  New 
York,  which  was  then  in  possession  of  the  Dutch,  whose  claim 
was  derived  from  Captain  Hudson's  visit  to  the  territory  in 
1609,  when  he  commanded  one  of  their  vessels,  and  was  em 
ployed  in  their  service.  Argal,  however,  maintained,  that,  as 
Hudson  was  an  Englishman  by  birth,  the  benefit  of  his  dis 
covery  accrued  by  indefeasible  right  to  his  native  country  ; 
and  the  Dutch  governor,  being  unprepared  for  resistance,  was 
compelled  to  submit,  and  declare  the  colony  a  dependency  of 
England,  and  tributary  to  Virginia.  But  another  governor  ar 
riving  shortly  after,  with  better  means  of  asserting  the  title  of 
his  countrymen,  the  concession  was  retracted,  and  the  English 
claim  successfully  defied.1 

One  of  the  first  objects  which  engaged  the  increasing  industry 
of  the  colonists  was   the   cultivation  of  tobacco,  a  commodity 
now  for  the  first  time  introduced  into  the  commerce  of  Virginia. 
[1615.]     King  James  had  conceived  a  strong  antipathy  to  the 
use  of  this  herb,  and  in  his  celebrated  treatise,  entitled  Coun 
terblast  against  Tobacco,  endeavoured  to  prevail  over  one  of 
the  strongest  appetites  of  human  nature  by  the  force   of  pe 
dantic  fustian,  and  reasoning  as  ridiculous  as  the  title  of  his  per 
formance.     The  issue  of  the  contest  corresponded  better  with 
his   interests    than    with   his    wishes  ;    his    testimony,    though 
pressed  with  all  the  vehemence  of  exalted  folly,  could  not  pre 
vail  with  his  subjects  over  the  solicitation  and  evidence  of  their 
own  senses  ;  and  though  he  summoned  his   prerogative  to  the 
aid  of  his  logic,  and  guarded  the  soil  of  England  from  pollution 
by  forbidding  the  domestic  culture  of  tobacco,  he  found  it  im 
possible  to  withstand  its  importation  from  abroad  ;  the  demand 
for  it  continuually  extended,  and  its  value   and   consumption 
daily  increased  in  England.     Incited  by  the  hopes  of  sharing  a 
trade  so  profitable,  the  colonists  of  Virginia  devoted  their  fields 
and  labor  almost  exclusively  to  the  production   of  this   com 
modity.     Sir  Thomas  Dale,  observing  their  inconsiderate  ar 
dor,  and  sensible  of  the  danger  of  neglecting  the  cultivation  of 
the  humbler  but  more  necessary  productions  on  which  the  sub 
sistence  of  the  colony  depended,  interposed  his   authority  to 

1  Stith.    See  the  History  of  New  York,  in  Book  V.  post. 


CHAP.   II.]  ARGAL'S  ADMINISTRATION.  67 

check  the  excesses  of  the  planters  ;  and  adjusted  by  law  the 
proportion  between  the  corn  crop  and  the  tobacco  crop  of  every 
proprietor  of  land.  But  after  his  departure  [1616],  his  wise 
policy  was  forgotten,  and  his  regulations  disregarded  ;  and  the 
culture  of  tobacco  so  exclusively  occupied  the  attention  of  the 
settlers,  that  even*  the  streets  of  Jamestown  were  planted  with 
it,  and  a  scarcity  of  provisions  very  soon  resulted.  The  colo 
nists,  unable  to  devise  any  better  remedy  for  this  evil  than  the 
renewal  of  exactions  from  the  Indians,  involved  themselves  in 
disputes  and  hostilities  which  gradually  alienated  the  regards 
of  these  savages,  and  paved  the  way  to  one  of  those  schemes 
of  vengeance  which  they  are  noted  for  forming  with  impene 
trable  secrecy,  maturing  with  consummate  artifice  and  exe 
cuting  with  unrelenting  ferocity.1  This  fatal  effect  was  not 
experienced  till  after  the  lapse  of  one  of  those  intervals  which 
to  careless  eyes  seem  to  disconnect  the  misconduct  from  the 
sufferings  of  nations,  but  impress  reflective  minds  with  an 
awful  conception  of  that  strong,  unbroken  chain,  which,  sub 
sisting  unimpaired  by  time  or  distance,  preserves  and  extends 
the  moral  consequences  of  human  actions. 

But  a  nobler  produce  than  any  that  her  physical  soil  could 
supply  was  to  grace  the  dawn  of  civilization  in  Virginia  ;  and 
we  are  now  to  contemplate  the  first  indication  of  that  active 
principle  of  liberty  which  was  destined  to  obtain  the  most  signal 
development  from  the  progress  of  American  society.  When 
Sir  Thomas  Dale  returned  to  England,  he  committed  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  province  to  George  Yeardley,  whose  lax  ad 
ministration,  if  it  removed  a  useful  restraint  on  the  improvident 
cupidity  of  the  planters,  enabled  them  to  taste,  and  prepared 
them  to  value,  the  dignity  of  independence  and  the  advantages  of 
freedom.  He  was  succeeded  [1617 2]  by  Captain  Argal,  a 
man  of  considerable  talent  and  activity,  but  sordid,  haughty,  and 
tyrannical.  Argal  provided  with  ability  for  the  wants  of  the  col 
ony,  and  introduced  some  politic  regulations  of  the  traffic  and 

1  Smith.  Stith.  Purchas.  In  the  year  1615,  was  published  at  London 
A  true  Discourse  of  the  present  State  of  Virginia,  by  Ralph  Hamar,  Secretary 
to  the  Colony ;  a  tract  wnich  has  no  other  merit  but  its  rarity. 

s  In  the  present  year  died  Pocahontas.  She  had  accompanied  her  husband 
on  a  visit  to  England,  where  her  history  excited  much  interest,  and  the  grace 
and  dignity  of  her  manners  no  less  respect  and  admiration.  Captain  Smith 
introduced  her  to  the  queen,  and  her  society  was  courted  by  the  most  eminent 


68  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

intercourse  with  the  Indians  ;  but  he  cramped  the  liberty  of  the 
people  by  minute  and  vexatious  restrictions,  and  enforced  a 
practical  conformity  to  them  by  harsh  and  constant  exercise  of 
martial  law.  While  he  affected  to  promote  piety  in  others  by 
punishing  absence  from  ecclesiastical  ordinances  with  a  tempo 
rary  servitude,  he  postponed,  in  his  own  personal  practice, 
every  other  consideration  to  the  acquisition  of  wealth,  which 
he  greedily  pursued  by  a  profligate  abuse  of  the  opportunities 
of  his  office,  and  defended  by  the  terrors  of  despotic  authority. 
Universal  discontent  was  excited  by  his  administration  ;  and 
the  complaints  of  the  colonists  at  length  reached  the  ears  of  the 
company  in  England.  Lord  Delaware,  who  had  always  been 
the  zealous  friend  and  advocate  of  the  colonists,  now  consented, 
for  their  deliverance,  to  resume  his  former  office,  and  again  to 
undertake  the  direction  of  their  affairs.  He  embarked  for  Vir 
ginia  [1618]  with  a  splendid  train,  but  died  on  the  voyage. 
His  loss  was  deeply  lamented  by  the  colonists.  Yet  it  was,  per 
haps,  an  advantageous  circumstance  for  them,  that  an  adminis 
tration  invested  with  so  much  pomp  and  dignity  wras  thus  sea 
sonably  intercepted,  and  the  improvement  of  their  affairs  com 
mitted  to  men  whose  rank  and  manners  were  nearer  the  level 
of  their  own  condition  ;  and  it  was  no  less  advantageous  to  the 
memory  of  Lord  Delaware,  that  he  died  in  the  demonstration 
of  a  generous  willingness  to  attempt  what  he  would  most  prob 
ably  have  been  unable  to  accomplish.  The  tidings  of  his  death 
were  followed  to  England  by  increasing  complaints  of  the 
odious  and  tyrannical  proceedings  of  Argal  ;  and  the  com 
pany  having  conferred  the  office  of  Captain-General  on  Yeard- 
ley  [April,  1619],  this  new  governor  received  the  honor 
of  knighthood,  and  repaired  to  the  scene  of  his  administra 
tion.1 

of  the  nobility.  But  the  mean  soul  of  the  king  regarded  her  with  jealousy  ; 
and  he  expressed  alternate  murmurs  at  Rolfe's  presumption  in  marrying  a 
princess,  and  alarm  at  the  title  that  this  planter's  posterity  might  acquire  to 
the  sovereignty  of  Virginia.  Pocahontas  died  in  the  faith,  and  with  the  senti 
ments  and  demeanour,  of  a  Christian.  —  Smith.  Stith.  She  left  a  son  by 
Rolfe,  whose  posterity,  says  a  modern  historian  of  Virginia,  "  are  not  unwor 
thy  of  their  royal  ancestry."  — Campbell.  An  American  writer,  in  1787,  re 
marks,  that  the  descendants  of  Rolfe  and  Pocahontas  had  then  lost  all  the  ex 
terior  characteristics  of  their  Indian  origin.  Dr.  Smith's  Essay  on  the  Causes 
of  the  Variety  of  Complexion  and  Figure  in  the  Human  Species. 
1  Smith.  Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]      FIRST  REPRESENTATIVE  LEGISLATURE.  69 

Sir  George  Yeardley,  on  his  arrival  in  Virginia,  perceived 
at  a  single  glance  that  it  was  impossible  to  compose  the  preva 
lent  jealousy  of  arbitrary  power  and  impatience  for  liberty,  or 
to  conduct  his  own  administration  in  a  satisfactory  manner, 
without  reinstating  the  colonists  in  full  possession  of  the  rights 
of  Englishmen  ;  and  accordingly,  to  their  inexpressible  joy, 
he  promptly  signified  his  intention  of  convoking  a  provincial  as 
sembly,  framed  with  all  possible  analogy  to  the  parliament  of 
the  parent  state.  This  first  representative  legislature  that 
America  ever  beheld  consisted  of  the  governor,  the  council, 
and  a  number  of  burgesses,  elected  by  the  seven  existing 
boroughs,  who,  assembling  at  Jamestown,  in  one  chamber,  dis 
cussed  all  matters  that  concerned  the  general  welfare,  and  con 
ducted  their  deliberations  with  good  sense,  moderation,  and 
harmony.  The  laws  which  they  enacted  were  transmitted  to 
England  for  the  approbation  of  the  treasurer  and  company, 
and  are  no  longer  extant  ;  but  it  is  asserted  by  competent 
judges,  that  they  were,  in  the  main,  wisely  and  judiciously 
framed,  though  (as  might  reasonably  be  expected)  somewhat 
intricate  and  unsystematical.1  The  company  soon  after  passed 
an  ordinance  by  which  they  substantially  approved  and  ratified 
the  platform  of  the  Virginian  legislature.  They  reserved,  how 
ever,  to  themselves  the  nomination  of  a  council  of  state,  which 
should  assist  the  governor  with  advice  in  the  executive  admin 
istration,  and  should  also  form  a  part  of  the  legislative  assem 
bly  ;  and  they  provided,  on  the  one  hand,  that  the  decrees  of 
the  assembly  should  not  have  the  force  of  law  till  sanctioned 
by  the  court  of  proprietors  in  England  ;  and  conceded,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  the  orders  of  this  court  should  have  no  force 
in  Virginia  till  ratified  by  the  provincial  assembly.2  Thus 
early  was  planted  in  America  that  representative  system  which 
forms  the  soundest  political  frame  wherein  the  spirit  of  liberty 
was  ever  embodied,  and  at  once  the  safest  and  most  efficient 
organ  by  which  its  energies  are  exercised  and  developed.  So 

1  Rolfe,  a,pud  Smith.  Stith.  The  assembly,  when  they  transmitted  their 
own  ordinances  to  England,  requested  the  general  court  to  prepare  a  digest 
for  Virginia  of  the  laws  of  England,  and  to  procure  for  it  the  sanction  of  the 
king's  approbation,  adding,  "  that  it  was  not  fit  that  his  subjects  should  be 
governed  by  any  other  rules  than  such  as  received  their  influence  from  him." 
—  Chalmers. 

8  Stith.     Hazard. 


70  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

strongly  imbued  were  the  minds  of  Englishmen  in  this  age  with 
those  generous  principles  which  were  rapidly  advancing  to  a 
first  manhood  in  their  native  country,  that,  wherever  they  set 
tled  themselves,  the  institutions  of  freedom  took  root  and  grew 
up  along  with  them. 

It  had  been  happy  for  the  morals  and  the  welfare  of  Vir 
ginia,  if  her  inhabitants,  like  their  countrymen  in  Massachusetts, 
had  oftener  elevated  their  eye  from  subordinate  agency  to  the 
great  First  Cause,  and  had  referred,  in  particular,  the  signal 
blessing  that  was  now  bestowed  on  them  to  the  will  and  bounty 
of  God.  Liberty,  so  derived,  acquires  at  once  its  firmest  and 
noblest  basis  ;  it  becomes  respected  as  well  as  beloved  ;  the 
dignity  of  the  origin  to  which  it  is  referred  influences  the 
ends  to  which  it  is  rendered  instrumental ;  and  all  men  are 
taught  to  feel  that  it  can  neither  be  viola'ted  nor  abused  without 
provoking  the  divine  displeasure.  It  is  this  preservative  prin 
ciple  alone,  which,  recognizing  in  the  abundance  of  divine 
goodness  the  extent  of  the  divine  claims,  prevents  the  choicest 
blessings  and  most  admirable  talents  from  cherishing  in  human 
hearts  an  ungrateful  and  counteracting  spirit  of  insolence  and 
pride,  —  a  spirit  which  led  the  Virginians  too  soon  to  plant 
the  rankest  weeds  of  tyrannic  injustice  in  that  field  where  the 
seeds  of  liberty  had  been  so  happily  sown. 

The  company  of  patentees  had  received  orders  from  the 
king  to  transport  to  Virginia  a  hundred  idle,  dissolute  persons 
who  were  in  prison  for  various  misdemeanours  in  London.1 
These  men  were  dispersed  through  the  province  as  servants 
to  the  planters  ;  and  the  degradation  of  the  provincial  charac 
ter  and  manners,  produced  by  such  social  intermixture,  was 
overlooked,  in  consideration  of  the  advantage  that  was  ex 
pected  from  so  many  additional  and  unpaid  laborers.  Having 
once  associated  felons  with  their  pursuits,  and  committed  the 
cultivation  of  their  fields  to  servile  and  depraved  hands,  the 
colonists  were  prepared  to  yield  to  the  temptation  which  speed- 

1  Stith.  Captain  Smith  relates,  that,  since  his  departure  from  the  colony, 
the  number  of  felons  and  vagabonds  transported  to  Virginia  brought  such  evil 
report  on  the  place,  "  that  some  did  choose  to  be  hanged  ere  they  would  go 
thither,  and  icere."  "This  custom,"  says  Stith,  "  hath  laid  one  of  the  finest 
countries  in  America  under  the  unjust  scandal  of  being  another  Siberia,  fit 
only  for  the  reception  of  malefactors  and  the  vilest  of  the  people." 


CHAP.  II.]  YOUNG  WOMEN  SENT  OUT   TO  VIRGINIA.          71 

ily  presented  itself,  and  to  blend,  in  barbarous  combination, 
the  character  of  oppressors  with  the  claims  and  condition  of 
freemen.  A  Dutch  ship,  from  the  coast  of  Guinea,  arriving 
in  James  River,  sold  to  the  planters  a  part  of  her  cargo  of 
negroes  ; l  and  as  this  hardy  race  was  found  more  capable  of 
enduring  fatigue  in  a  sultry  climate  than  Europeans,  the  num 
ber  was  increased  by  continual  importation,  till  a  large  pro 
portion  of  the  inhabitants  of  Virginia  was  composed  of  men 
degraded  to  a  state  of  slavery  by  the  selfishness  and  ungrateful 
barbarity  of  others,  who,  embracing  the  gifts  without  imbibing 
the  beneficence  of  their  Creator,  turned  into  a  scene  of  bond 
age  for  their  fellows  the  territory  that  had  proved  a  seat  of 
liberty  and  happiness  to  themselves. 

Another  addition,  at  this  epoch  [1620],  more  productive  of 
virtue  and  felicity,  was  made  to.  the  number  of  the  colonists. 
Few  women  had  as  yet  ventured  to  cross  the  Atlantic  ;  and  the' 
English,  restrained  by  the  pride  and  rigidity  of  their  character 
from  that  incorporation  with  the  native  Americans,  which  the 
French  and  Portuguese  have  foun'd  so  conducive  to  their  in 
terests  and  so  accordant  with  the  pliancy  of  their  manners, 
were  generally  destitute  of  the  comforts  and  connections  of 
married  life.  Men  so  situated  could  not  regard  Virginia  as  a 
permanent  residence,  and  must  have  generally  entertained  the 
purpose  of  returning  to  their  native  country  after  amassing  as 
expeditiously  as  possible  a  competency  of  wealth.  Such  views 
are  inconsistent  with  patient  industry,  and  with  those  extended 
interests  that  produce  or  support  patriotism  ;  and  in  conformity 
with  the  more  liberal  policy  which  the  company  now  began  to 
pursue  towards  the  colony,  it  was  proposed  to  send  out  a  hun 
dred  young  women  of  agreeable  persons  and  respectable  char 
acters,  as  wives  for  the  settlers.  Ninety  were  sent  ;  and  the 
speculation  proved  so  profitable  to  the  company,  that  a  repe 
tition  of  it  was  suggested  by  the  emptiness  of  their  exchequer 
in  the  following  year  [1621],  when  sixty  more  were  collect 
ed  and  transported.  They  were  immediately  disposed  of  to 
the  young  planters,  and  produced  such  an  accession  of  happi 
ness  to  the  colony,  that  the  second  consignment  fetched  a 

1  Beverley,  History  of  Virginia. 


72  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

larger  profit  than  the  first.  The  price  of  a  wife  was  estimated 
first  at  a  hundred  and  twenty,  and  afterwards  at  a  hundred  and 
fifty  pounds  of  tobacco,  which  was  then  sold  at  three  shillings 
per  pound.  The  young  women  were  not  only  bought  with 
avidity,  but  received  with  such  fondness,  and  so  comfortably 
established,  that  others  were  invited  to  follow  their  example  ; 
and  virtuous  sentiments  and  provident  habits  spreading  conse 
quently  among  the  planters  enlarged  the  happiness  and  pros 
perity  of  the  colony.1  To  the  blessings  of  marriage  naturally 
succeeded  some  provision  for  the  benefits  of  education.  A 
sum  of  money  was  collected  by  the  English  bishops,  by  direc 
tion  of  the  king,  for  the  maintenance  of  an  institution  in  Vir 
ginia  for  the  Christian  education  of  Indian  children  ;  and  in 
emulation  of  this  good  example,  various  steps  were  taken  by 
the  chartered  company  towards  the  foundation  of  a  provincial 
college,  which  was  afterwards  completed  in  the  reign  of  Wil 
liam  and  Mary. 

It  is  remarkable  that  the  rise  of  civil  liberty  in  North  Ameri 
ca  was  nearly  coeval  with  the  first  dispute  between  her  inhab 
itants  and  the  government  of  the  mother  country.  With  the 
increasing  industry  of  the  colony,  the  produce  of  its  tobacco- 
fields  became  more  than  sufficient  for  the  supply  of  England, 
where,  also,  its  disposal  was  vexatiously  restricted  by  the  wa 
vering  and  arbitrary  policy  of  the  king,  in  granting  monopo 
lies  for  the  sale  of  it,  in  limiting  the  quantities  permitted  to 
be  imported,  in  appointing  commissioners  "  for  garbling  the 
drug  called  tobacco,"  with  arbitrary  powers  to  confiscate  what 
ever  portions  of  it  they  might  consider  of  base  quality,  in 
loading  the  importation  with  a  heavy  duty,  and  at  the  same 
time  encouraging  the  import  of  tobacco  from  Spain.  The 
company,  harassed  by  these  absurd  and  iniquitous  restraints, 
opened  a  trade  with  Holland,  and  established  warehouses  in 
that  country,  to  which  they  sent  their  tobacco  directly  from 

1  Stith.  This  interesting  branch  of  traffic  appears  to  have  subsisted  for 
many  years,  during  which  its  seeming  indelicacy  was  qualified  as  far  as  pos 
sible  by  the  nice  attention  that  was  paid  to  the  ascertainment  of  the  moral 
character  of  every  woman  aspiring  to  become  a  Virginian  matron.  In  the 
year  1632,  by  an  order  of  the  provincial  council,  two  young  women,  who  had 
been  seduced  during  their  passage  from  England,  were  ordered  to  be  sent 
back,  as  "  unworthy  to  propagate  the  race  of  Virginians." — Burk's  History 
of  Virginia. 


CHAP.  II.]        THE  TOBACCO  TRADE.  73 

Virginia  ;  but  the  king  interposed  to  prohibit  such  evasion  of 
his  revenue,  and  directed  that  all  the  Virginian  tobacco  should 
be  brought  in  the  first  instance  to  England.  A  lengthened  and 
acrimonious  dispute  arose  between  this  feeble  prince  and  the 
colonists  and  colonial  corporation.  Against  the  monopoly  es 
tablished  in  England  they  petitioned  the  House  of  Commons  ; 
and  in  support  of  their  practice  of  trading  directly  with  Hol 
land,  they  contended  for  the  general  right  of  Englishmen  to 
carry  their  commodities  to  the  best  market  they  could  find,  and 
pleaded  the  special  concessions  of  their  own  charter,  which 
expressly  conferred  on  them  unlimited  liberty  of  commerce. 
At  length,  the  dispute  was  adjusted  by  a  compromise,  by 
which  the  company  obtained,  on  the  one  hand,  the  exclusive 
right  of  importing  tobacco  into  the  kingdom,  and  engaged,  on 
the  other,  to  pay  an  import  duty  of  ninepence  per  pound,  and 
to  send  all  the  tobacco  produce  of  Virginia  to  England.1 

But  a  cloud  had  been  for  some  time  gathering  over  the  colo 
ny  ;  and  even  the  circumstances  that  were  supposed  most 
forcibly  to  betoken  the  prosperity  of  its  inhabitants  were  pro 
voking  the  storm  to  burst  with  more  destructive  violence  on 
their  heads.  [1622.]  At  peace  with  the  Indians,  unappre 
hensive  of  danger,  and  wholly  engrossed  with  the  profitable 
cultivation  of  a  fertile  territory,  their  increasing  numbers  had 
spread  so  extensively  over  the  province,  that  no  fewer  than 
eighty  settlements  were  already  formed  ;  and  every  planter  be 
ing  guided  only  by  his  own  peculiar  taste  or  convenience  in  the 
choice  of  his  dwelling,  and  more  disposed  to  shun  than  to 
court  the  neighbourhood  of  his  countrymen,  the  settlements 
were  universally  straggling  and  uncompact.2  In  the  Scriptures, 
which  the  colonists  received  as  their  rule  of  faith,  they  might 
have  found  ample  testimony  to  the  cruelty  and  treachery  of 
mankind  in  their  natural  state  ;  and  from  their  own  experience 
they  might  have  derived  the  strongest  assurance  that  the  sav 
ages,  by  whom  they  were  surrounded,  could  claim  no  exemp 
tion  from  this  testimony  of  divine  wisdom  and  truth.  Yet  the 
pious  labors  by  which  the  evil  dispositions  of  the  Indians 
might  have  been  corrected,  and  the  military  exercises  and  pre- 

1  Stith.  2  Smith. 

VOL.    I.  10 


74  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

cautions  by  which  their  hostility  might  have  been  overawed  or 
repelled,  were  equally  neglected  by  the  English  settlers  ;  who, 
moreover,  contributed  to  foster  the  martial  habits  of  the  Indians 
by  employing  them  as  hunters,  and  enlarged  their  resources  of 
destruction  by  furnishing  them  with  firearms,  which  they  very 
soon  learned  to  use  with  dexterity. 

The  marriage  of  the  planter  «Rolfe  to  the  Indian  princess 
did  not  produce  as  lasting  a  friendship  between  the  English 
and  the  Indians  as  at  first  it  seemed  to  portend.  The  Indians 
eagerly  courted  a  repetition  of  such  intermarriages,  and  were 
painfully  stung  by  the  disdain  with  which  the  English  receded 
from  their  advances  and  declined  to  become  the  husbands  of 
Indian  women.1  The  colonists  forgot  that  they  had  inflicted 
this  mortification  ;  but  it  was  remembered  by  the  Indians,  who 
sacredly  embalmed  the  memory  of  every  affront  in  lasting, 
stern,  silent,  and  implacable  resentment.  Earnest  recommen 
dations  were  repeatedly  transmitted  from  England  to  attempt  the 
conversion  of  the  savages  ;  but  these  recommendations  were 
not  promoted  by  a  sufficient  attention  to  the  means  requisite 
for  their  accomplishment.  Yet  neither  were  they  entirely  neg 
lected  by  the  colonists.  Some  attempts  at  conversion  were 
made  by  a  few  pious  individuals,  and  the  success  of  one  of 
them  undoubtedly  mitigated  the  calamity  that  was  impending  ; 
but  these  efforts  were  feeble  and  partial,  and  the  majority  of 
the  colonists  had  contented  themselves  with  cultivating  a  friend 
ly  acquaintance  with  the  Indians,  who  were  admitted  at  all 
times  into  their  habitations,  and  encouraged  to  consider  them 
selves  as  welcome  and  familiar  guests.2 

It  was  in  the  midst  of  this  free  and  unguarded  intercourse, 
that  the  Indians  formed,  with  deliberate  and  unrelenting  fero 
city,  the  project  of  a  general  massacre  of  the  English,  which 
devoted  every  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the  colony  to  indis 
criminate  destruction.  On  the  death  of  Powhatan,  in  1618, 

1  Beverley. 

*  Stith.  To  the  remonstrances  of  certain  of  the  colonists  against  their  wor 
ship  of  demons,  some  of  the  Indians  of  Virginia  answered  that  they  believed 
in  two  great  spirits,  a  good  and  an  evil  one  ;  that  the  first  was  a  being  sunk 
in  the  enjoyment  of  everlasting  indolence  and  ease,  who  showered  down  bless 
ings  indiscriminately  from  the  skies,  leaving  men  to  scramble  for  them  as 
they  chose,  and  totally  indifferent  to  their  concerns ;  but  that  the  second  was 
an  active,  jealous  spirit,  whom  they  were  obliged  to  propitiate,  that  he  might 
not  destroy  them.  —  Oldmixon. 

• 


CHAP.  II.]  INDIAN   CONSPIRACY.  75 

the  power  of  executing  a  scheme  so  daring  and  sanguinary 
devolved  on  a  man  fully  capable  of  contriving  and  conducting 
it.  Opechancanough,1  who  succeeded  to  the  supremacy  over 
Powhatan's  tribe,  and  possessed  extensive  influence  over  all 
the  neighbouring  tribes  of  Indians,  was  distinguished  by  his 
ferocious  bravery,  his  profound  dissimulation,  and  a  rancorous 
hatred  and  jealousy  of  the  European  colonists  of  America. 
He  renewed  the  pacific  treaty  which  Powhatan  had  con 
cluded  with  the  English  after  the  marriage  of  his  daughter  to 
Rolfe  ;  and  he  availed  himself  of  the  security  into  which  it 
lulled  the  objects  of  his  guile,  to  prepare,  during  the  four  en 
suing  years,  his  friends  and  followers  for  the  several  parts  they 
were  to  act  in  the  tragedy  which  he  contemplated.  The 
tribes  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  English,  except  those  on 
the  eastern  shore,  whom,  on  account  of  their  peculiar  friend 
ship  for  the  colonists,  he  did  not  venture  to  intrust  with  the 
design,  were  successively  gained  over  ;  and  all  cooperated 
with  that  singlemindedness  and  intensity  of  purpose  character 
istic  of  Indian  conspiracy  and  revenge. 

In  a  tribe  of  savage  idolaters,  the  passions  of  men  are  left 
unpurified  by  the  influence  of  religion,  and  unrestrained  by  a 
sound  or  elevated  morality  ;  and  human  character  is  not  sub 
jected  to  that  variety  of  impulse  and  impression  which  it  under 
goes  in  civilized  society.  The  sentiments  inculcated  and  the 
dispositions  contracted  in  the  family  and  in  the  tribe,  in  do 
mestic  education  and  in  public  life,  in  all  the  scenes  through 
which  the  savage  passes  from  his  cradle  to  his  grave,  are  the 
same  ;  there  is  no  contest  of  opposite  principles  or  conflicting 
habits  to  dissipate  his  mind  or  weaken  its  determinations  ;  and 
the  system  of  morals  (if  it  may  be  so  called)  which  he  em 
braces,  being  the  offspring  of  wisdom  and  dispositions  con 
genial  to  his  own,  a  seeming  dignity  of  character  arises  from 
the  simple  vigor  and  consistency  of  that  conduct  which  his 
moral  sentiments  never  disturb  or  reproach.  The  understand- 

1  Stith.  —  Opechancanough,  in  imitation  of  the  English,  had  built  himself 
a  house,  and  was  so  delighted  with  the  contrivance  of  a  lock  and  key,  that  he 
used  to  spend  whole  hours  in  repetition  of  the  experiment  of  locking  and  un 
locking  his  door.  —  Oldmixon.  No  European  invention  struck  the  Indians 
witii  greater  surprise  than  a  windmill ;  they  came  from  vast  distances  and 
continued  for  many  days  to  gaze  at  a  phenomenon  which  they  ascribed  to  the 
agency  of  demons  shut  up  within  the  edifice. 


76  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ing,  neither  refined  by  variety  of  knowledge,  nor  elevated  by 
the  grandeur  of  its  contemplations,  instead  of  moderating  the 
passions,  becomes  the  abettor  of  their  violence  and  the  instru 
ment  of  their  gratification.  Men  in  malice,  but  children  in 
sense  it  is  in  the  direction  of  fraud  and  cunning  that  the 
intellectual  faculties  of  savages  are  chiefly  exercised  ;  and  so 
perfect  is  the  harmony  between  their  passions  and  their  reflec 
tive  powers,  that  the  same  delay  which  would  mitigate  the 
ferocity  of  more  cultivated  men  serves  but  to  harden  their 
cruelty  and  mature  the  devices  for  its  indulgence.  Notwith 
standing  the  long  interval  that  elapsed  between  the  formation 
and  the  execution  of  their  present  enterprise,  and  the  continual 
intercourse  that  subsisted  between  them  and  the  white  people, 
the  most  impenetrable  secrecy  was  preserved  by  the  Indians  ; 
and  so  fearless,  consummate,  and  inscrutable  was  their  dissimu 
lation,  that  they  were  accustomed  to  borrow  boats  from  the 
English  to  cross  the  river,  in  order  to  concert  and  communi 
cate  the  progress  of  their  design.1 

An  incident,  which,  though  minute,  is  too  curious  to  be 
omitted,  contributed  to  stimulate  the  malignity  of  the  Indians 
by  the  sense  of  recent  provocation.  There  was  a  man,  be 
longing  to  one  of  the  neighbouring  tribes,  called  Nemattanow, 
who,  by  his  courage,  craft,  and  good  fortune,  had  attained  the 
highest  repute  among  his  countrymen.  In  the  skirmishes  and 
engagements  which  their  former  wars  with  the  English  produced, 
he  had  exposed  his  person  with  a  bravery  that  commanded 
the  esteem  of  his  fellow-savages,  and  an  impunity  that  excited 
their  astonishment.  They  judged  him  invulnerable,  whom  so 
many  dangers  had  vainly  menaced  ;  and  the  object  of  their 
admiration  partook,  or  at  least  encouraged,  the  delusion  which 
seemed  to  invest  him  with  a  character  of  sanctity.  Opechan- 
canough,  the  king,  whether  jealous  of  this  man's  reputation, 
or  desirous  of  embroiling  the  English  with  the  Indians,  sent 
a  message  to  the  governor  of  the  colony,  to  acquaint  him  that 
he  was  welcome  to  cut  Nemattanow's  throat.  Such  an  indi 
cation  of  Indian  character  as  this  message  afforded  ought  to 
have  produced  alarm  and  distrust  in  the  minds  of  the  English. 

1  Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]  MASSACRE  OF  THE  COLONISTS.  77 

Though  the  offer  of  the  king  was  disregarded,  his  wishes 
were  not  disappointed.  Nemattanow,  having  murdered  a 
planter,  was  shot  by  one  of  the  servants  of  his  victim,  who 
attempted  to  arrest  him.  In  the  pangs  of  death,  the  pride,  but 
not  the  vanity,  of  the  savage  was  subdued,  and  he  entreated 
his  captors  that  they  would  never  reveal  that  he  had  been  slain 
by  a  bullet,  and  that  they  would  bury  him  among  the  English, 
in  order  that  the  secret  of  his  mortality  might  remain  unknown 
to  his  countrymen.  The  request  seems  to  infer  the  possibility 
of  complying  with  it ;  and  the  colonists,  by  whom  it  was  neg 
lected,  had  cause  to  regret  their  imprudent  disclosure  of  the 
fatal  event.  The  Indians  were  filled  with  grief  and  indig 
nation  ;  and  Opechancanough  inflamed  their  anger  by  pretend 
ing  to  share  it.  Having  counterfeited  displeasure  for  the  satis 
faction  of  his  subjects,  he  affected  placability  for  the  delusion 
of  his  enemies,  and  assured  the  English  that  the  sky  should 
sooner  fall  than  the  peace  be  broken  by  him.  But  the  plot 
meanwhile  advanced  to  maturity,  and,  at  last,  the  day  was 
fixed  on  which  all  the  English  settlements  were  at  the  same 
instant  to  be  attacked.  The  respective  stations  of  the  various 
troops  of  assassins  were  assigned  to  them  ;  and  that  they  might 
be  enabled  to  occupy  their  posts  without  awakening  suspicion, 
some  carried  presents  of  fish  and  game  into  the  interior  of  the 
colony,  and  others  presented  themselves  as  guests  soliciting 
the  hospitality  of  their  English  friends,  on  the  evening  before 
the  massacre.  As  the  fatal  hour  drew  nigh,  the  rest,  under 
various  pretences,  and  with  every  demonstration  of  kind  and 
peaceful  intent,  assembled  around  the  detached  and  unfortified 
settlements  of  the  colonists  ;  and  not  a  sentiment  of  compunc 
tion,  not  a  rash  expression  of  hate,  nor  an  unguarded  look  of 
exultation,  had  occurred  to  disconcert  or  disclose  the  purpose 
of  their  well  disciplined  ferocity. 

The  universal  destruction  of  the  colonists  seemed  unavoid 
able,  and  was  prevented  only  by  the  consequences  of  an  event, 
which,  perhaps,  at  the  time  when  it  came  to  pass,  appeared 
but  of  little  importance  in  the  colony,  —  the  conversion  of  an 
Indian  to  the  Christian  faith.  On  the  night  before  the  mas 
sacre,  this  man  was  made  privy  to  it  by  his  own  brother,  who 
communicated  to  him  the  command  of  his  king  and  his  country- 


78  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

men  to  share  in  the  exploit  that  would  enrich  their  race  with 
spoil,  revenge,  and  glory.  A  summons  of  such  tenor  was 
well  calculated  to  prevail  with  a  savage  mind  ;  but  a  new  mind 
had  been  given  to  this  convert,  and,  as  soon  as  his  brother  left 
him,  he  revealed  the  secret  to  an  English  gentleman  in  whose 
house  he  was  residing.  This  planter  immediately  carried  the 
tidings  to  Jamestown,  from  whence  the  alarm  was  communi 
cated  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  nearest  settlements  barely  in 
time  to  prevent  the  last  hour  of  the  perfidious  truce  from  being 
the  last  hour  of  their  lives. 

But  the  intelligence  came  too  late  to  be  more  generally  avail 
able.  At  mid-day  [March  22,  1622] ,  the  moment  they  had  pre 
viously  fixed  for  this  execrable  deed,  the  Indians,  raising  a  hid 
eous  yell,  rushed  at  once  on  the  English  in  all  their  scattered 
settlements,  and  butchered  men,  women,  and  children  with  un- 
distinguishing  fury,  and  every  aggravation  of  brutal  outrage  and 
enormous  cruelty.  In  one  hour,  three  hundred  and  forty-seven 
persons  were  cut  off,  almost  without  knowing  by  whose  hands 
they  fell.  The  slaughter  would  have  been  still  greater,  if  the 
English,  even  in  some  of  those  districts  where  no  prior  inti 
mation  of  the  danger  was  received,  had  not  flown  to  their  arms 
with  the  energy  of  despair,  and  defended  themselves  so  bravely 
as  to  repulse  the  assailants,  who  almost  universally  displayed 
a  cowardice  proportioned  to  their  malignity,  and  fled  at  the 
sight  of  weapons  in  the  hands  even  of  the  women  and  boys, 
whom,  unarmed,  they  were  willing  to  attack  and  destroy.1 

The  colony  received  a  wound  no  less  deep  and  dangerous 
than  painful  and  alarming.  Six  of  the  members  of  council, 
and  several  of  the  wealthiest  and  most  respectable  inhabitants, 
were  among  the  slain  ;  at  some  of  the  settlements,  the  whole 
of  their  population  had  been  exterminated  ;  at  others,  a  rem 
nant  escaped  the  general  destruction  by  the  efforts  of  despair  ; 
and  the  survivors  were  impoverished,  terrified,  and  •  confound 
ed  by  a  stroke  that  at  once  bereaved  them  of  friends  and  for 
tune,  and  showed  that  they  were  surrounded  by  legions  of 
foes,  whose  enmity  was  equally  furious  and  unaccountable,  and 
whose  treachery  and  ferocity  seemed  to  proclaim  them  a  race- 

1  Smith.    Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]       RETALIATORY  MEASURES.  79 

of  fiends  rather  than  men.1  To  the  massacre  succeeded  a 
vindictive  and  exterminating  war  between  the  English  and  the 
Indians  ;  and  the  colonists  were  at  last  provoked  to  retaliate, 
in  some  degree,  the  fraudful  guile  and  indiscriminate  butchery 
to  which  they  found  themselves  exposed  from  their  savage 
adversaries.  But  though  a  dire  necessity  was  thought  to  jus 
tify  or  palliate  such  proceedings,  yet  the  warfare  of  the  colo 
nists  was  never  wholly  divested  of  honor  and  magnanimity. 
During  this  disastrous  period,  the  design  that  had  been  enter 
tained  of  erecting  a  provincial  college,  and  various  other  public 
institutions,  was  abandoned  ;  the  number  of  the  settlements 
was  reduced  from  eighty  to  six ;  and  an  afflicting  dearth  of 
food  was  added  to  the  horrors  of  war.2 

When  the  tidings  of  this  calamity  arrived  in  England,  they 
excited,  along  with  much  disapprobation  of  the  defective  poli 
cy  and  inefficient  precautions  of  the  company  of  patentees,  a 
lively  sympathy  with  the  danger  and  distress  of  the  colonists. 
By  order  of  the  king,  a  supply  of  arms  from  the  Tower  was 
delivered  to  the  treasurer  of  the  company  ;  and  vessels  were 
despatched  to  Virginia  with  cargoes  of  such  articles  as  were 
supposed  to  be  most  urgently  needed  by  the  planters.  Captain 
Smith  submitted  to  the  company  the  project  of  an  enterprise, 
which  he  offered  to  conduct,  for  the  deliverance  of  the  colony 
by  the  expulsion  or  subjugation  of  all  the  Indian  tribes  within 
the  limits  of  its  territory  ;  but,  though  generally  approved,  this 
proposition  was  not  embraced.  By  dint  of  the  exertions  which 
they  made  in  their  own  behalf,  and  with  the  assistance  of  the 
supplies  that  were  actually  sent  to  them  from  England,  the 
colonists  were  barely  saved  from  perishing  with  hunger  ;  and 

1  It  was  long  before  the  British  colonists  were  properly  on  their  guard 
against  the  ferocity  of  a  race  of  men  capable  of  such  consummate  treachery, 
and  who  "  in  anger  were  not,  like  the  English,  talkative  and  boisterous,  but 
sullen  and  revengeful." — Trumbull's  History  of  Connecticut. 

2  Stith.     As  far  as  I  am  able  to  discover,  the  retaliatory  deceit  practised  by 
the  colonists  in  their  hostilities  with  the  Indians  has  been  greatly  overrated. 
Stith  seems  to  have  mistaken  expressions  of  indignation  for  deliberate  designs ; 
and  Dr.  Robertson  has  extended  the  error  by  mistaking  purposes  for  the  exe 
cution  they  never  attained.    The  contemplation,  and  especially  the  endurance, 
of  cruelty  tends  to  make  men  cruel ;  yet,  to  the  honor  of  the  colonists,  be  it 
remembered,  that,  even  during  the  prevalence  of  these  hostilities,  a  deliberate 
attempt  to  cozen  and  subjugate  a  body  of  Indians  was  punished  by  the  provin 
cial  magistrates,  as  an  offence  against  the  law  of  God  and  against  national  faith 
and  honor.  —  Stith. 


80  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

it  was  not  till  after  a  severe  and  protracted  struggle  that  they 
were  enabled  again  to  resume  their  prosperous  attitude  and 
extend  their  settlements. 

More  ample  supplies  and  more  active  assistance  would  have 
been  afforded  to  the  colonists  from  England,  but  for  the  dis 
sensions  among  the  associated  patentees,  which  had  been 
spreading  for  a  considerable  period,  and  at  this  juncture  at 
tained  a  height  that  portended  the  dissolution  of  the  corpora 
tion.  The  company  was  now  a  numerous  body  ;  and  being 
composed  of  able  and  enterprising  men,  drawn  from  every  class 
in  society,  it  presented  a  faithful  abstract  of  the  state  of  po 
litical  feeling  in  the  nation  ;  while  its  frequent  courts  or  convo 
cations  afforded  a  convenient  arena  in  which  the  parties  tried 
their  strength,  and  a  conspicuous  organ  by  which  the  prevailing 
sentiments  were  publicly  expressed.  At  every  meeting,  the 
transaction  of  business  was  impeded  by  the  intrigues  of  rival 
factions,  and  the  debates  were  inflamed  and  protracted  by  their 
mutual  altercations.  At  every  election,  the  offices  of  the  com 
pany  were  courted  and  contested  by  the  most  eminent  persons 
in  the  state.  [1623.]  The  controversy  between  the  court 
party  and  the  country  party,  that  was  spreading  through  the 
nation,  was  the  more  readily  insinuated  into  those  assemblies 
from  the  infrequency  and  irregularity  of  its  more  legitimate 
theatre,  the  parliament  ;  and  various  circumstances  in  the  his 
tory  of  the  company  tended  to  nourish  and  extend  this  source 
of  disagreement.  Many  of  the  proprietors,  dissatisfied  with 
the  slender  pecuniary  returns  that  the  colony  afforded,  were 
disposed  to  blame  the  existing  officers  and  administration  for 
the  disappointment  of  their  hopes  ;  not  a  few  resented  the  pro 
curement  of  the  third  charter,  the  exclusion  of  Captain  Smith 
from  the  direction  which  he  had  shown  himself  so  well  qualified 
to  exercise,  and  the  insignificance  to  which  they  were  them 
selves  condemned  by  the  arbitrary  multiplication  of  their  asso 
ciates  ;  and  a  small  but  active  and  intriguing  party,  who  had  la 
bored  with  earnest  though  unsuccessful  rapacity  to  engross 
the  offices  of  the  company,  to  usurp  the  direction  of  its  affairs, 
and  to  convert  the  colonial  trade  into  their  own  private  patri 
mony  by  monopolies  which  they  bought  from  needy  courtiers, 
naturally  ranged  themselves  on  the  side  of  the  court,  and  by 


CHAP.  II.]    DISSENSIONS  OF  THE  LONDON  COMPANY.         81 

their  complaints  and  misrepresentations  to  the  king  and  privy 
council,  sought  to  interest  them  in  the  quarrels,  and  infect 
them  with  suspicions  of  the  corporation.1 

At  the  head  of  this  least  numerous,  but  most  dangerous,  fac 
tion  was  the  notorious  Captain  Argal,  who  continued  to  dis 
play  a  rancorous  enmity  to  the  liberty  of  Virginia,  and  hoped 
to  compass  by  intrigue  and  servility  at  home  the  same  objects 
which  he  had  pursued  by  tyranny  and  violence  abroad.  Sir 
Thomas  Smith,  too,  the  treasurer,  whose  predilection  for  ar 
bitrary  government  we  have  already  had  occasion  to  remark, 
encouraged  every  complaint  and  proposition  that  tended  to 
abridge  the  privileges  of  the  colonial  company,  and  give  to  its 
administration  a  less  popular  form.  The  arbitrary  changes 
which  the  charter  had  already  undergone  taught  ah1  the  malcon 
tents  to  look  up  to  the  crown  for  such  farther  alterations  as 
might  remove  the  existing  obstructions  to  their  wishes  ;  and 
the  complete  ascendency  which  the  country  party  acquired  in 
the  company  strongly  disposed  the  king  to  suppress  or  modify 
an  institution  that  served  to  cherish  public  spirit  and  dissemi 
nate  liberal  opinions.  "  These  Virginia  courts,"  said  Gonde- 
mar,  the  Spanish  envoy,  to  him,  "  are  but  a  seminary  to  a 
seditious  parliament."2  The  hardihood  which  the  company 
had  displayed  in  their  late  dispute  with  him  concerning  the 
restrictions  of  their  tobacco  trade,  the  freedom  with  which  his 
policy  was  canvassed  in  their  deliberations,  the  firmness  with 
which  his  measures  were  resisted,  and'  the  contempt  they  had 
shown  for  the  supremacy  alike  of  his  wisdom  and  his  preroga 
tive  in  complaining  to  the  House  of  Commons,  eradicated  from 
the  mind  of  James  all  that  partiality  to  an  institution  of  his 
own  creation,  that  might  have  sheltered  it  from  the  habitual 
dislike  and  suspicion  with  which  he  regarded  the  authority  of 
a  popular  assembly.  But  the  same  qualities  that  rendered 
them  odious  caused  them  also  to  appear  somewhat  formidable, 
and  enforced  some  attention  to  equitable  appearances,  and 

1  Stith. 

2  So  powerful  were  the  leaders  of  the  Virginia  company,  that  they  could 
influence  the  election  of  members  of  parliament.     Under  their  auspices,  the 
pious  and  accomplished  Nicholas  Ferrar  obtained  about  this  time  a  seat  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  where  he  distinguished  himself  by  an  active  opposition 
to  the  court.  —  Bishop  Turner's  Life  of  Ferrar. 

VOL.    I.  11 


82  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

deference  to  public  opinion,  in  wreaking  his  displeasure  upon 
them.  The  murmurs  and  discontents,  that  were  excited  in 
England  by  the  intelligence  of  the  Indian  massacre,  furnished 
him  with  an  opportunity  which  he  did  not  fail  to  improve. 

Having  signalized  his  own  concern  for  the  misfortunes  of 
the  colony  by  sending  thither  a  quantity  of  military  stores  for 
defence  against  the  Indians,  and  by  issuing  his  mandate  to  the 
company  to  despatch  an  ample  supply  of  provisions,  he  pro 
ceeded  to  institute  an  inquiry  into  the  cause  of  the  disaster. 
A  commission  was  addressed  to  certain  of  the  English  judges 
and  other  persons  of  distinction  [May,  1623],  requiring  them 
to  examine  the  transactions  of  the  corporation  since  its  first 
establishment  ;  to  report  to  the  privy  council  the  causes  of 
the  late  disasters  ;  and  to  suggest  the  expedients  most  likely 
to  prevent  their  recurrence.1  In  order  to  obstruct  the  efforts 
of  the  company  for  their  own  vindication,  and  to  discover, 
if  possible,  additional  matter  of  accusation  against  them,  meas 
ures  the  most  arbitrary  and  tyrannical  were  employed.  All 
their  charters,  books,  and  papers  were  seized  ;  two  of  their 
principal  officers  were  arrested  ;  and  all  letters  from  the  colo 
ny  intercepted  and  carried  to  the  privy  council.  Among  the 
witnesses  whom  the  commissioners  examined  was  Captain 
Smith,  who  might  reasonably  be  supposed  to  entertain  little 
favor  for  the  existing  constitution  of  the  corporate  body  by 
which  his  career  of  honor  and  usefulness  had  been  abridged, 
and  who  had  recently  sustained  the  mortification  of  seeing  his 
offer  to  undertake  the  defence  of  the  colony  and  subjugation 
of  the  Indians  treated  with  thankless  disregard,  notwithstanding 
the  approbation  of  a  numerous  party  of  the  proprietors.  Smith 
ascribed  the  misfortunes  of  the  colony,  and  the  slenderness  of 
the  income  derived  from  it,  to  the  neglect  of  military  pre 
cautions  ;  the  rapid  succession  of  governors,  which  stimulated 
the  rapacity  of  their  dependents  ;  the  multiplicity  of  public 
offices,  by  which  industry  was  loaded  and  revenue  absorbed  ; 
and,  in  general,  to  the  inability  of  a  numerous  body  of  men 
to  conduct  an  undertaking  so  complex  and  arduous.  He  rec 
ommended  the  annexation  of  the  colony  and  of  all  the  juris- 

1  Stith. 


CHAP.  II.]  ROYAL   MANDATE.  83 

diction  over  it  to  the  crown,  the  introduction  of  greater  sim 
plicity  and  economy  into  the  frame  of  its  government,  and  an 
abandonment  of  the  practice  of  transporting  criminals  to  its 
shores.1 

The  commissioners  did  not  communicate  any  of  their  transac 
tions  to  the  company,  who  first  learned  the  tenor  of  the  report 
in  which  they  were  so  deeply  interested  from  an  order  of  the 
king  and  privy  council  [Oct.  1623],  signifying  to  them  that 
the  misfortunes  of  Virginia  had  arisen  from  their  misgovern- 
ment,  and  that,  for  the  purpose  of  repairing  them,  his  Majesty 
had  determined  to  revoke  the  old  charter  and  issue  a  new  one, 
which  should  commit  the  powers  of  government  to  fewer 
hands.  In  order  to  quiet  the  minds  of  the  colonists,  it  was 
declared,  that  private  property  would  be  respected,  and  that  all 
past  grants  of  land  should  remain  inviolate.  An  instant  sur 
render  of  their  privileges  was  required  from  the  company  ;  and, 
in  default  of  their  voluntary  submission,  they  were  assured  that 
the  king  was  prepared  to  carry  his  purpose  into  effect  by  pro 
cess  of  Jaw.2 

This  arbitrary  mandate  produced  so  much  astonishment  and 
consternation  in  the  assembled  court  of  proprietors,  that  a  long 
and  deep  silence  ensued  on  its  communication.  But,  resuming 
their  spirit,  they  prepared  to  defend  their  rights  with  a  resolu 
tion,  which,  if  it  could  not  avert  their  fate,  at  least  redeemed 
their  character.  They  indignantly  refused  to  sanction  the  stig 
ma  affixed  to  their  conduct  by  the  order  of  council,  —  to  sur 
render  the  franchises  which  they  had  legally  obtained,  and  on 
the  faith  of  which  they  had  expended  large  sums  of  money,  — 
or  to  consent  to  the  abolition  of  a  popular  frame  of  govern 
ment,  and  deliver  up  their  countrymen  in  Virginia  to  the  do 
minion  of  a  narrow  junto  wholly  dependent  on  the  pleasure  of 
the  king.  In  these  sentiments  they  persisted,  in  spite  of  all 
the  threats  and  promises  by  which  their  firmness  was  assailed  ; 

1  Smith. 

2  Stith.     It  was  in   the   midst  of  those   distractions,  says   Stith,  that  the 
Muses  for  the  first  time  opened  their  lips  in  North  America.     One  of  the 
earliest   literary  productions  of  the    English   colonists  was  a  translation   of 
Ovid's   Metamorphoses,  made   in    1623  by    George  Sandys,  treasurer  of  the 
Virginia  Company.     It  was  afterwards  published  in  England,  and  dedicated 
to  Charles  the  First.     Stith  terms  it  "  a  laudable  performance  for  the  times  "  ; 
and  Dryden  mentions  the  author  with  respect,  in  the  preface  to  his  own  trans 
lations  from  Ovid. 


84  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

and  by  a  vote,  which  only  the  dissent  of  Captain  Argal  and 
seven  of  his  adherents  rendered  not  quite  unanimous,  they 
finally  rejected  the  king's  proposal,  and  declared  their  resolu 
tion  to  defend  themselves  against  any  process  he  might  insti 
tute. 

Incensed  at  their  audacity  in  disputing  his  will,  James  di 
rected  a  writ  of  quo  warranto  to  be  issued  against  the  com 
pany,  in  order  to  try  the  validity  of  their  charter  in  the  Court 
of  King's  Bench.  With  the  hope  of  collecting  additional 
proofs  of  their  maladministration,  he  despatched  envoys  to 
Virginia  to  inspect  the  condition  of  the  colony,  and  attempt  to 
form  a  party  there  opposed  to  the  pretensions  of  the  court  of 
proprietors.  The  royal  envoys,  finding  the  provincial  assem 
bly  embodied  [Feb.  1624],  endeavoured,  with  great  artifice 
and  magnificent  promises  of  military  aid,  and  of  other  marks  of 
royal  favor,  to  detach  the  members  from  their  adherence  to  the 
company,  and  to  procure  an  address  to  the  king,  expressive 
of  "  their  willingness  to  submit  to  his  princely  pleasure  in  re 
voking  the  ancient  patents."  But  their  exertions  were  un 
successful.  The  assembly  transmitted  a  petition  to  the  king, 
professing  satisfaction  to  find  themselves  the  objects  of  his 
especial  care,  beseeching  him  to  continue  the  existing  form 
of  government,  and  soliciting,  that,  if  the  promised  military 
force  should  be  granted  to  them,  it  might  be  placed  under 
the  control  of  their  own  governor  and  house  of  representa 
tives.  The  domestic  legislation  of  this  assembly  was  marked 
by  the  same  good  sense  and  patriotism  that  appeared  in  the 
reception  which  it  gave  to  the  propositions  of  the  royal  envoys. 
The  governor  was  deprived  of  an  arbitrary  authority  which 
he  had  hitherto  exercised.  It  was  ordained  that  he  should 
no  longer  have  power  to  withdraw  the  inhabitants  from  their 
private  labors  to  his  own  service,  and  should  levy  no  taxes 
but  such  as  the  provincial  assembly  should  impose  and  appro 
priate.  White  women  still  were  objects  of  great  scarcity  and 
value  in  the  colony  ;  and  to  obviate  an  inconvenience  that  re 
sulted  from  the  ardor  and  frequency  of  amorous  competition, 
a  fine  was  now  imposed  on  any  woman  who  should  encourage 
the  matrimonial  addresses  of  more  than  one  man  at  a  time. 
Various  wise  and  judicious  laws  were  enacted  for  the  improve- 


CHAP.  II.]  THE   COMPANY  DISSOLVED.  85 

ment  of  manners  and  the  reformation  of  abuses,  the  support  of 
divine  worship,  the  security  of  civil  and  political  freedom,  and 
the  regulation  of  traffic  with  the  Indians. 

Whether  the  suit  between  the  king  and  the  company  was 
prosecuted  to  a  judicial  consummation  or  not  is  a  point  in 
volved  in  some  uncertainty,  and  truly  of  very  little  importance ; 
for  the  issue  of  a  suit  between  the  king  and  any  of  his  subjects 
at  that  period  could  never  be  doubtful  for  a  moment.  Well 
aware  of  this,  the  company  looked  to  protection  more  efficient 
than  the  ordinary  administration  of  law  could  afford  them,  and 
presented  a  petition  to  the  House  of  Commons,  detailing  a 
part  of  their  grievances,  and  soliciting  redress.  Their  appli 
cation  wTas  entertained  by  the  House  so  cordially,  that,  had  it 
been  sooner  presented,  it  might  have  saved  the  corporation  ; 
but  they  had  deferred  this  last  resource  till  so  late  a  period  of 
the  session  of  parliament,  that  there  was  not  time  to  enter  on 
the  wide  inquiry  which  their  complaints  demanded  ;  and  fear 
ing  to  exasperate  the  king  by  preferring  odious  charges  which 
they  could  not  hope  to  substantiate,  they  confined  their  plead 
ing  before  the  House  to  the  discouragement .  of  their  tobacco 
trade,  which  the  Commons  without  hesitation  pronounced  a 
national  grievance.  They  gained  no  other  advantage  from 
their  complaint,  nor  from  their  limitation  of  it.  The  king,  en 
raged  at  their  presumption,  and  encouraged  by  their  timidity, 
launched  forth  a  proclamation  [July,  1624],  suppressing  the 
courts  of  the  company,  and  committing  the  temporary  admin 
istration  of  the  colonial  affairs  to  certain  of  his  privy  counsel 
lors,  in  conjunction  with  Sir  Thomas  Smith  and  a  few  other 
persons.1  The  Virginia  Company  was  thus  dissolved,  and  its 
rights  and  privileges  reabsorbed  by  the  crown. 

James  did  not  suffer  the  powers  he  had  resumed  to  remain 
long  unexercised.  He  issued  a  special  commission  [August, 
1624],  appointing  a  governor  and  twelve  counsellors,  to  whom 
the  direction  of  the  affairs  of  the  colony  was  intrusted.  No 
mention  was  made  in  this  instrument  of  a  house  of  representa 
tives  ;  a  circumstance,  which,  coupled  with  the  subsequent  im 
position  of  royal  proclamations  as  legislative  edicts,  has  led  al- 

1  Rymer.     Hazard. 


86  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

most  all  the  historians  of  Virginia  into  the  mistaken  belief,  that 
the  provincial  assembly  was  abolished  along  with  the  mercantile 
corporation.  The  commission  ascribes  the  disasters  of  the 
settlement  to  the  popular  shape  of  its  late  government,  which 
intercepted  and  weakened  the  beneficial  influence  of  the  king's 
superior  understanding  ;  and,  in  strains  of  the  most  vulgar  and 
luscious  self-complacency,  prospectively  celebrates  the  pros 
perity  which  the  colony  must  infallibly  attain,  when  blessed  with 
the  director  rays  of  royal  wisdom.  With  this  demonstration 
of  hostility  to  the  political  liberties  of  the  colonists,  there  was 
mingled  some  favorable  attention  to  their  commercial  interests  ; 
for,  in  consequence  of  the  remonstrance  of  the  English  parlia 
ment  [Sept.  1624],  James  renewed  by  proclamation  his  former 
prohibition  of  the  culture  of  tobacco  in  England,  and  restricted 
the  importation  of  this  commodity  to  Virginia  and  the  Somer 
Isles,  and  to  vessels  belonging  to  British  subjects.1 

This  was  James's  last  public  act  in  relation  to  the  colony  ; 
for  his  intention  of  composing  a  code  of  laws  for  its  domestic 
administration  was  frustrated  by  his  death.  [1625.]  He  died 
the  first  British  sovereign  of  an  established  empire  in  America  ; 
and  thus  closed  a  reign,  of  which  the  only  illustrious  feature 
was  the  colonization  which  he  impelled  or  promoted.  To  this 
favorite  object  both  the  virtues  and  the  vices  of  his  character 
proved  subservient.  If  the  merit  he  might  claim  from  his 
original  patronage  of  the  Virginian  colonists  be  cancelled  by  his 
subsequent  efforts  to  bereave  them  of  their  liberties  ;  and  if 
his  persecution  of  the  Puritans  in  their  native  country  be  but 
feebly  counterbalanced  by  his  willingness  to  grant  them  an  asy 
lum  in  New  England  ;  —  his  attempts  to  civilize  Ireland  by 
colonization  connect  him  more  honorably  with  the  great  events 
of  his  reign.  Harassed  by  the  turbulent  and  distracted  state 
of  Ireland,  and  averse  to  the  sanguinary  remedy  of  military 
operation,  he  endeavoured  to  impart  a  new  character  to  its  in 
habitants  by  planting  colonies  of  the  English  in  the  six  northern 
counties  of  that  island.  He  prosecuted  this  plan  with  so  much 
wisdom  and  steadiness,  as  to  cause,  in  the  space  of  nine  years, 
greater  advances  towards  the  reformation  of  Ireland  than  were 

1  Rymer.     Hazard. 


CHAP.  II.]  EFFECT  OF  THE  COMPANY'S  DISSOLUTION.        87 

made  in  the  four  hundred  and  forty  years  which  had  elapsed 
since  the  conquest  of  the  country  was  first  attempted,  and  laid 
the  foundation  of  whatever  affluence  and  security  it  has  since 
been  enabled  to  attain.1  It  is  difficult  to  recognize  the  dog 
matical  oppressor  of  the  Puritans,  and  the  weak  and  arrogant 
tyrant  of  Virginia,  in  the  wise  and  humane  legislator  of  Ireland. 

The  fall  of  the  Virginia  Company  excited  the  less  concern, 
and  the  arbitrary  measures  of  the  king  the  less  odium,  in  Eng 
land,  from  the  disappointments  and  calamities  with  which  the 
colonial  plantation  had  been  attended.  More  than  a  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand  pounds  2  were  already  expended  on  this  set 
tlement,  and  upwards  of  nine  thousand  inhabitants  had  been 
sent  to  it  from  the  mother  couutry.  Yet,  at  the  dissolution  of 
the  company,  the  gross  value  of  the  annual  imports  from  Vir 
ginia  did  not  exceed  twenty  thousand  pounds,  and  the  popula 
tion  of  the  province  was  reduced  to  about  eighteen  hundred 
persons.3  The  effect  of  this  unprosperous  issue,  in  facilitating 
the  overthrow  of  the  corporation,  may  be  regarded  as  a  fortu 
nate  circumstance  for  Virginia  ;  for,  however  unjust  and  tyran 
nical  were  the  views  and  conduct  of  the  king,  they  were  over 
ruled  to  the  production  of  a  most  important  benefit  to  the  colo 
ny,  in  the  suppression  of  an  institution  which  would  have  dan 
gerously  loaded  and  cramped  its  infant  prosperity  and  freedom. 
It  is  an  observation  of  the  most  eminent  teacher  of  political  sci 
ence,  that,  of  all  the  expedients  that  could  possibly  be  contrived 
to  stunt  the  natural  growth  of  a  new  colony,  the  institution  of  an 
exclusive  company  is  the  most  effectual ; 4  and  the  observation 
is  confirmed  by  the  experience  of  history.  In  surveying  the 
constitutions  and  tracing  the  progress  of  the  various  colonial 
establishments  which  the  nations  of  Europe  have  successfully 
formed,  we  find  a  close  and  invariable  connection  between  the 
decline  and  the  revival  of  their  prosperity  and  the  ascendency 
and  overthrow  of  sovereign  mercantile  corporations. 

A  sovereign  company  of  merchants  must  ever  consider  their 
political  power  as  an  instrument  of  commercial  gain,  and  as  de 
riving  its  chief  value  from  the  means  it  gives  them  to  repress 
competition,  to  buy  cheaply  the  commodities  they  obtain  from 

1  Leland's  History  of  Ireland.     Hume's  History  of  England. 

2  Smith.  3  Chalmers's  Annals.  *  Smith's  Wealth  of  Nations. 


88  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

their  subject  customers,  and  to  sell  as  dearly  as  possible  the 
articles  with  which  they  supply  them  ;  that  is,  to  diminish  the 
incitement  and  the  reward  of  industry  to  the  colonists,  by  re 
stricting  their  powers  and  opportunities  of  acquiring  what  they 
need  and  disposing  of  what  they  have.  The  mercantile  habits 
of  the  rulers  prevail  over,,  their  political  interest,  and  lead  them 
not  only  to  prefer  immediate  profit  to  permanent  revenue,  but 
to  adapt  their  administration  to  this  policy,  and  render  govern 
ment  subservient  to  the  purposes  of  monopoly.  They  are  al 
most  necessarily  led  to  devolve  a  large  discretionary  power  on 
their  provincial  officers,  over  whom  they  retain  at  the  same 
time  but  a  feeble  control.  Whether  we  regard  the  introduc 
tion  of  martial  law  into  Virginia  as  the  act  of  the  company,  or 
(as  it  really  seems  to  have  been)  the  unauthorized  act  of  the 
treasurer  and  the  provincial  governors,  the  prevalence  it  ob 
tained  displays,  in  either  case,  the  unjust  and  arbitrary  policy 
of  an  exclusive  company,  or  the  inability  of  such  a  sovereign 
body  to  protect  its  subjects  against  the  oppression  of  its  offi 
cers.  How  incapable  an  organ  of  this  description  must  be  to 
conduct  a  plan  of  civil  policy  on  fixed  and  stable  principles, 
and  how  strongly  its  system  of  government  must  tend  to  per 
petual  fluctuation,  is  attested  by  the  fact,  that,  in  the  course 
of  eighteen  years,  no  fewer  than  ten  successive  governors  had 
been  appointed  to  preside  over  the  province.  Even  after  the 
vigorous  spirit  of  liberty,  which  was  so  rapidly  gaining  ground 
in  that  age,  had  enabled  the  colonists  to  extort  from  the  com 
pany  the  right  of  composing  laws  for  the  regulation  of  their 
own  community,  still,  as  the  company's  sanction  was  requisite 
to  give  legal  prevalence  to  the  enactments  of  the  provincial 
legislature,  the  paramount  authority  resided  with  men  who  had 
but  a  temporary  interest  in  the  fate  of  their  subjects  and  the  re 
sources  of  their  territories.  While,  therefore,  we  sympathize 
with  the  generous  indignation  which  the  historians  of  America 
have  expressed  at  the  tyrannical  measures  by  which  the  com 
pany  was  dissolved,  we  must  regard  with  satisfaction  an  event, 
which,  by  its  concomitant  circumstances,  inculcated  an  abhor 
rence  of  arbitrary  power,  and  by  its  operation  overthrew  a  sys 
tem  under  which  no  colony  has  ever  grown  up  to  a  vigorous 
maturity. 


CHAP.  II.]     ARBITRARY  POLICY  OF  CHARLES  I.  89 

Charles  the  First  inherited  [March,  1625],  with  his  father's 
throne,  all  the  maxims  that  had  latterly  regulated  his  colonial 
policy.  Of  this  he  hastened  to  give  assurance  to  his  subjects 
by  a  series  of  proclamations,  which  he  issued  soon  after  his  ac 
cession  to  the  crown,  and  which  distinctly  unfolded  the  arbi 
trary  principles  which  he  entertained,  and  the  tyrannical  ad 
ministration  he  intended  to  pursue.  He  declared,  that,  after 
mature  deliberation,  he  had  adopted  his  father's  opinion,  that 
the  misfortunes  of  the  colony  were  occasioned  by  the  demo- 
cratical  frame  of  its  civil  constitution,  and  the  incapacity  of  a 
mercantile  company  to  conduct  even  the  most  insignificant  af 
fairs  of  state  ;  that  he  held  himself  in  honor  engaged  to  accom 
plish  the  work  that  James  had  begun  ;  that  he  considered  the 
American  colonies  to  be  a  part  of  the  royal  empire  devolved 
to  him  with  the  other  dominions  of  the  crown  ;  that  he  was 
fully  resolved  to  establish  a  uniform  course  of  government 
through  the  whole  British  monarchy  ;  and  that  henceforward 
the  entire  administration  of  the  Virginian  government  should  be 
vested  in  a  council  nominated  and  directed  by  himself,  and  re 
sponsible  to  him  alone.  This  unlimited  arrogation  of  power 
has  given  rise  to  the  common  belief,  that  Charles  deemed  the 
provincial  assembly  already  abolished  ;  and  the  arbitrary  man 
ner  in  which  the  functions  of  this  body  were  repeatedly  super 
seded  by  exertions  of  royal  prerogative  in  the  earlier  part  of 
the  present  reign  has  induced  the  greater  number  of  the  histo 
rians  of  Virginia  erroneously  to  suppose  and  relate,  that  no  as 
sembly  was  actually  convoked  in  the  province  during  that  pe 
riod.  But  in  truth  neither  the  king  nor  his  father  seems  to 
have  entertained  the  design  of  extirpating  the  popular  branch 
of  the  constitution.  Their  object  appears  to  have  been  to  re 
duce  it  to  what  they  conceived  a  due  subordination  to  the  su 
premacy  of  their  own  prerogative  ;  and  to  vindicate  and  de- 
velope  the  efficacy  of  royal  proclamations,  both  in  suspending 
laws  already  made,  and  in  legislating  for  cases  not  yet  regulated 
by  statutory  provision. 

While  Charles  expressed  the  utmost  scorn  of  the  capacity  of 
a  mercantile  corporation,  he  did  not  disdain  to  embrace  its  illib 
eral  spirit,  and  copy  its  interested  policy.  As  a  specimen  of  the 
extent  of  legislative  authority  which  he  intended  to  exert,  and  of 

VOL.    I.  12 


90  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.1  [BOOK  I. 

the  purposes  to  which  he  meant  to  render  it  subservient,  he 
prohibited  the  Virginians,  under  the  most  absurd  and  frivolous 
pretences,  from  selling  their  tobacco  to  any  persons  but  certain 
commissioners  appointed  by  himself  to  purchase  it  on  his  own 
account.1  Thus  the  colonists  found  themselves  subjected  to  a 
municipal  administration  that  combined  the  vices  of  both  its  pre 
decessors,  —  the  unlimited  prerogative  of  an  arbitrary  prince, 
with  the  narrowest  maxims  of  a  mercantile  corporation  ;  and 
saw  their  legislatorial  rights  invaded,  their  laws  and  usages  ren 
dered  uncertain,  all  the  profits  of  their  industry  engrossed,  and 
their  only  valuable  commodity  monopolized  by  the  sovereign, 
who  pretended  to  have  resumed  the  government  of  the  colony 
only  in  order  to  blend  it  more  perfectly  with  the  general  frame 
of  the  British  empire. 

Charles  conferred  the  office  of  governor  of  Virginia  on  Sir 
George  Yeardley,  and  empowered  him,  in  conjunction  with  a 
council  of  twelve  persons,  to  exercise  the  authority  of  an  in 
definite  prerogative  ;  to  make  and  execute  laws  ;  to  impose 
and  levy  taxes  ;  to  seize  the  property  of  the  late  company,  and 
apply  it  to  public  uses  ;  and  to  transport  the  colonists  to  Eng 
land,  to  be  tried  there  for  offences  committed  in  Virginia.  The 
governor  and  council  were  specially  directed  to  exact  the  oaths 
of  allegiance  and  supremacy  from  every  inhabitant  of  the  colo 
ny,  and  in  all  points  to  conform  their  own  conduct  to  the  in 
structions  which  from  time  to  time  the  king  might  transmit  to 
them.2  [1627.]  Yeardley 's  early  death  prevented  the  full 
weight  of  his  authority  from  being  experienced  by  the  colonists 
during  his  short  administration.  He  died  in  the  beginning  of 
the  year  1627,  and,  two  years  after,  was  succeeded  by  Sir 
John  Harvey.  Meanwhile,  and  during  a  long  subsequent 
course  of  time,  the  king,  who  seems  to  have  inherited  his 
father's  prejudices  respecting  tobacco,3  continued  to  restrict 
and  encumber  the  importation  and  sale  of  this  commodity  by  a 
series  of  regulations  so  vexatious,  oppressive,  multifarious,  and 

1  Rymer.     Hazard.    Burk.  2  Chalmers. 

3  That  he  inherited  also  his  father's  style  of  writing  against  the  use  of  this 
commodity  appears  from  a  letter  which  he  addressed  to  the  governor  and 
council  of  Virginia  in  1627,  in  which  he  declares,  that  "  it  may  well  be  said 
that  the  plantation  is  wholly  built  on  smoke,  which  will  easily  turn  into  air, 
if  either  English  tobacco  be  permitted  to  be  planted,  or  Spanish  imported."  — 
Burk. 


CHAP.  II.]       HARVEY'S  TYRANNICAL  CONDUCT.  91 

unsteady,  that  it  is  impossible  to  undergo  the  fatigue  of  pe 
rusing  them  without  a  mixture  of  contempt  for  the  fluctuations 
and  caprice  of  his  counsels,  and  of  indignant  pity  for  the  wast 
ed  prosperity  and  abused  patience  of  his  people.  Notwith 
standing  these  disadvantages,  however,  the  colonial  population 
increased  with  rapidity  ;  and  in  the  year  1628  more  than  a 
thousand  persons  emigrated  from  Europe  to  Virginia.1 

Sir  John  Harvey,  the  new  governor,  proved  a  fit  instrument 
to  carry  the  king's  system  of  arbitrary  rule  into  complete  exe 
cution.  Haughty,  rapacious,  and  cruel,  he  exercised  an  odious 
authority  with  the  most  offensive  insolence,  and  by  the  rigor 
of  his  executive  energy  increased  the  provocation  inspired  by 
his  legislatorial  usurpation  and  injustice.  His  disposition  was 
perfectly  congenial  with  the  system  which  he  conducted  ;  and 
so  thoroughly  did  he  personify  as  well  as  administer  tyranny, 
as  not  only  to  attract,  but  to  engross  in  his  own  person,  the 
odium  of  which  a  large  share  was  properly  due  to  the  prince 
who  employed  him.  He  added  every  decree  of  the  Court  of 
High  Commission  in  England  to  the  ecclesiastical  constitutions 
of  Virginia  ;  and  selected  for  especial  enforcement  every  regu 
lation  of  English  law  which  was  unsuitable  to  the  circumstances 
of  the  colonists,  and  therefore  likely  to  entail  and  multiply  legal 
penalties,  all  of  which  were  commuted  into  fines  and  forfeitures 
appropriated  to  the  governor.2  Of  the  length  to  which  he  car 
ried  his  arbitrary  exactions  and  tyrannical  confiscations  some 
notion  may  be  formed  from  a  letter  of  instructions  by  which 
the  royal  committee  of  council  for  the  colonies  in  England  at 
length  thought  proper  [July,  1634]  to  inculcate  on  him  a  more 
moderate  demeanour.  It  signified,  that  the  king,  in  the  pleni 
tude  of  his  bounty,  and  for  the  encouragement  of  the  planters, 
desired  that  the  interests  which  had  been  acquired  under  the 
late  corporation  should  be  respected,  and  that  the  colonists, 
"  for  the  present,  shall  enjoy  their  estates  with  the  same  free 
dom  and  privilege  as  they  did  before  the  recalling  of  the  pa 
tent."3 

We  might  suppose  this  to  be  the  mandate  of  an  Eastern  sul 
tan  to  one  of  his  satraps  ;  and,  indeed,  the  rapacious  tyranny  of 

1  Rymer.    Chalmers.    Hazard.    Campbell.  2  Beverley.    Burk. 

3  State  Papers,  ap.  Chalmers. 


92  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

the  governor  seems  hardly  more  odious  than  the  cruel  mercy 
of  the  prince,  who  interposed  to  mitigate  oppression  only  when 
it  had  reached  an  extreme  which  is  proverbially  liable  to  in 
flame  the  wise  with  madness  and  drive  the  patient  to  despair. 
The  most  significant  comment  on  the  letter  is,  that  Harvey 
was  neither  censured  nor  displaced  for  the  injustice  which  it 
commanded  him  to  restrain.  The  effect,  moreover,  which  it 
was  calculated  to  produce,  in  ascertaining  the  rights  and  quiet 
ing  the  apprehensions  of  the  colonists,  was  counterbalanced  by 
large  and  vague  grants  of  territory  within  the  province,  wrhich 
Charles  inconsiderately  bestowed  on  his  courtiers,  and  which 
gave  rise  to  numerous  encroachments  on  established  possession, 
and  excited  general  distrust  of  the  validity  of  titles  and  the 
stability  of  property.  The  consequence  of  one  of  these  grants 
was  the  formation  of  the  State  of  Maryland,  by  dismembering 
a  large  portion  of  territory  that  was  previously  annexed  to  Vir 
ginia.  For  many  years,  this  event  proved  a  source  of  much 
discontent  and  serious  inconvenience  to  the  Virginian  colonists, 
who  had  endeavoured  to  improve  their  trade  by  restricting 
themselves  to  the  exportation  only  of  tobacco  of  superior 
quality,  and  now  found  themselves  deprived  of  all  the  advan 
tage  of  this  sacrifice  by  the  transference  of  a  portion  of  their 
own  territory  to  neighbours  who  refused  assent  to  their  regu 
lations.1 

The  instructions  communicated  by  the  letter  of  the  royal 
committee  left  Harvey  still  in  possession  of  ample  scope  to 
his  tyranny  [1635]  ;  and  the  colonial  assembly,  respecting  or 
overawed  by  the  authority  with  which  he  was  invested,  endured 
it  for  some  time  longer  without  resistance,  and  practically  re 
stricted  their  own  functions  to  the  degrading  ceremonial  of 
registering  the  edicts  and  decrees  of  their  tyrant.  At  length, 
after  a  spirited,  but  ineffectual,  attempt  to  curb  his  excesses  by 
enactments  which  he  disregarded,  the  assembly,  yielding  to  the 
general  desire  of  their  constituents,  suspended  him  from  his 
office,  and  sent  him  a  prisoner  to  England,  along  with  two 
deputies  from  their  own  body,  who  were  charged  with  the  duty 
of  representing  the  grievances  of  the  colony  and  the  misconduct 

1  Beverley. 


CHAP.  II.]       VIRGINIA  APPEALS  TO  THE   KING.  93 

of  the  governor.  But  their  reliance  on  the  justice  of  the  king 
proved  to  be  very  ill  founded.  Charles  was  fated  to  teach  his 
subjects,  that,  if  they  meant  to  retain  their  liberties,  they  must 
prepare  to  defend  them  ;  that  neither  submissive  patience  nor 
respectful  remonstrance  could  avail  to  relax  or  divert  his  arbi 
trary  purposes  ;  and  that,  in  order  to  obtain  justice  to  them 
selves,  they  must  deprive  him  of  the  power  of  withholding  it. 
The  inhabitants  of  Virginia  endured  oppression  (of  which  he 
had  already  avowed  his  consciousness)  with  long  resignation, 
and,  even  when  their  yoke  became  intolerable,  showed  that 
they  neither  imputed  their  wrongs  to  him  nor  doubted  his  dis 
position  to  redress  them.  Against  the  hardships  and  ill  treat 
ment  to  which  they  were  exposed,  they  appealed  to  him  as 
their  protector,  and  implored  a  relief  to  which  their  claim  was 
supported  by  every  consideration  that  could  impress  a  just  or 
move  a  generous  mind.  Yet,  instead  of  commiserating  their 
sufferings,  or  redressing  their  wrongs,  Charles  resented  their 
conduct  on  this  occasion  as  an  act  of  presumptuous  audacity 
little  short  of  rebellion  ;  and  all  the  applications  of  their  depu 
ties  were  rejected  with  cairn  injustice  and  inflexible  disdain. 
Harvey,  released  from  his  bonds,  became  in  his  turn  the  ac 
cuser  ;  and  the  calumnies  of  the  disgraced  and  banished  tyrant 
were  listened  to  with  complacency  and  attention,  while  the 
representatives  of  the  brave  and  loyal  people  whom  he  had  op 
pressed  were  regarded  as  traitors,  and  forbidden  to  appear  in 
the  presence  of  their  sovereign.  The  king  refused  to  hear  a 
single  word  from  the  provincial  deputies,  either  in  defence  of 
their  countrymen  or  in  crimination  of  Harvey  ;  and,  having  re 
instated  this  obnoxious  governor  in  his  office,  sent  him  back  to 
Virginia  [April,  1637]  with  a  renovation  of  the  powers  which 
he  had  so  grossly  abused.  There,  elated  with  his  triumph, 
and  inflamed  with  rage,  Harvey  resumed  and  aggravated  a  ty 
rannical  sway  that  has  entailed  infamy  on  himself  and  disgrace 
on  his  sovereign,  and  provoked  complaints  so  loud  and  vehe 
ment,  that  they  began  to  penetrate  into  England,  where  they 
produced  an  impression,  which,  mingling  with  the  general  irri 
tation  in  the  parent  state,  could  not  be  safely  disregarded.1 

1  Chalmers.    Oldmixon.    Burk. 


94  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

If  the  administration  of  Sir  John  Harvey  had  been  pro 
tracted  much  longer,  it  must  have  ended  in  the  revolt  or  the 
ruin  of  the  colony.  So  great  was  the  distress  it  occasioned, 
as  to  excite  the  earnest  attention  of  the  Indians,  and  awaken 
their  slumbering  hostility  by  suggesting  the  hope  of  exerting  it 
with  success.  Opechancanough,  the  ancient  enemy  of  the 
colonists,  was  now  far  advanced  in  years  [1638]  ;  but  age, 
though  it  had  bent  his  body  and  dimmed  his  eyes,  had  neither 
impaired  his  discernment  nor  extinguished  his  animosity. 
Proud,  subtle,  sly,  fierce,  and  cruel,  he  watched,  with  en 
during  and  considerate  hate,  the  opportunity  of  redeeming  his 
glory  and  satiating  his  revenge.  Seizing  the  favorable  occasion 
presented  by  the  distracted  state  of  the  province,  he  again  led 
his  warriors  to  a  sudden  and  furious  attack,  which  the  colonists 
did  not  repel  without  the  loss  of  five  hundred  men.  A  general 
war  ensued  between  them  and  all  the  Indian  tribes  under  the 
influence  of  Opechancanough.1 

But  a  great  change  was  now  [1639]  to  reward  the  patience 
of  the  Virginians  with  a  bloodless  redress  of  their  grievances. 
The  public  discontents,  which  had  for  many  years  been  gather 
ing  force  and  virulence  in  England,  were  advancing  with  rapid 
strides  to  a  full  maturity,  and  threatened  to  issue  in  some  vio 
lent  eruption.  After  a  long  intermission,  Charles  was  forced 
to  contemplate  the  reassembling  of  a  parliament  ;  and  perfect 
ly  aware  of  the  ill-humor  already  engendered  by  his  government 
at  home,  he  had  reason  to  apprehend  that  the  displeasure  of 
the  Commons  would  be  inflamed,  and  their  worst  suspicions 
confirmed,  by  representations  of  the  despotism  exercised  in 
Virginia.  There  was  yet  time  to  soothe  the  irritation,  and 
even  secure  the  adherence  of  a  people,  who,  in  spite  of  every 
wrong,  retained  a  generous  attachment  to  the  prince  whose 
sovereignty  was  regarded  as  the  bond  of  political  union  be 
tween  them  and  the  parent  state  ;  and  from  the  propagation 
of  the  complaints  of  colonial  grievances  in  England,  it  was 
easy  to  foresee  that  the  redress  of  them,  if  longer  withheld  by 
the  king,  would  be  granted,  to  the  great  detriment  of  his  credit 
and  influence,  by  the  parliament.  To  this  assembly  the  Vir- 

1  Beverley. 


CHAP.  II.]      PROVINCIAL  LIBERTIES  RESTORED.  95 

ginians  had  applied  on  a  former  occasion,  and  the  encourage 
ment  they  had  met  with  increased  the  probability  both  of  a 
repetition  of  their  application  and  of  a  successful  issue  to  it. 
These  considerations  alone  seem  to  account  for  the  entire  and 
sudden  alteration  which  the  colonial  policy  of  the  king  under 
went  at  this  period.  Harvey  was  recalled,  and  the  govern 
ment  of  Virginia  was  committed  [1641],  first,  to  Sir  Francis 
Wyatt,  and  afterwards  to  Sir  William  Berkeley,  —  a  person 
not  only  of  superior  rank  and  abilities  to  any  of  his  immediate 
predecessors,  but  distinguished  by  every  popular  virtue  of 
which  Harvey  was  deficient,  —  of  upright  and  honorable  char 
acter,  mild  and  prudent  temper,  and  manners  at  once  dignified 
and  engaging.  A  change  not  less  gratifying  was  introduced 
into  the  system  of  government.  The  new  governor  was  in 
structed  to  recognize  in  the  amplest  manner  the  legislative 
privileges  of  the  provincial  assembly,  and  to  invite  this  body 
to  compose  a  code  of  laws  for  the  province,  and  improve  the 
administration  of  justice  by  introduction  of  the  forms  of  Eng 
lish  judicial  procedure. 

Thus,  all  at  once,  and  when  they  least  expected  it,  was  re 
stored  to  the  colonists  the  full  enjoyment  of  those  liberties 
which  they  had  originally  procured  from  the  Virginian  Compa 
ny,  and  which  had  been  exposed  to  continual  peril  and  viola 
tion  from  the  same  authority  by  which  the  company  itself  was 
subverted.  Universal  joy  and  gratitude  were  excited  through 
out  the  colony  ;  and  the  king,  who,  amidst  the  hostility  that 
lowered  upon  him  from  every  other  quarter  of  his  dominions, 
was  addressed  in  the  language  of  grateful  loyalty  by  this  people, 
seems  to  have  been  a  little  touched  by  the  generous  sentiments 
which  he  had  so  ill  deserved,  and  which  forcibly  proved  to 
him  how  cheap  and  easy  were  the  means  by  which  princes 
may  render  their  subjects  attached  and  happy.  And  yet  so 
strong  were  the  illusions  of  his  self-love,  or  so  deliberate  his 
artifice,  that,  in  his  answer  to  an  address  of  the  colonists,  he 
eagerly  appropriated  the  praise  for  which  he  was  indebted  to 
their  generosity  alone,  and  endeavoured  to  extend  the  applica 
tion  of  their  expressions  of  gratitude  even  to  the  policy  from 
which  he  had  desisted  in  order  to  awaken  this  sentiment.1 

1  Beverley.     Chalmers.     Campbell. 


96  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

While  Charles  thus  again  introduced  the  principles  of  the 
British  constitution  into  the  domestic  government  of  Virginia, 
he  was  not  inattentive  to  the  policy  of  preserving  its  depend 
ence  on  the  mother  country,  and  securing  to  England  the  ex 
clusive  possession  of  the  colonial  trade.  [1641.]  For  this 
purpose  Sir  William  Berkeley  was  directed  to  prohibit  all 
commerce  with  other  nations,  and  to  require  a  bond  from  the 
master  of  every  vessel  sailing  from  Virginia,  obliging  him  to 
land  his  cargo  in  some  part  of  the  king's  dominions  in  Europe, 
Yet  the  pressure  of  this  restraint  was  more  than  counter 
balanced  by  the  gracious  strain  of  the  other  contemporary 
measures  of  the  crown  ;  and  with  a  mild  and  liberal  domestic 
government,  which  offered  a  peaceful  asylum  and  distributed 
ample  tracts  of  land  to  all  emigrants  who  sought  its  protection, 
the  colony  advanced  so  rapidly  in  prosperity  and  population, 
that,  at  the  beginning  of  the  civil  war  in  the  parent  state,  it 
contained  upwards  of  twenty  thousand  inhabitants.  By  the 
vigor  and  conduct  of  Sir  William  Berkeley,  the  Indian  war, 
after  a  few  campaigns,  was  brought  to  a  successful  close  ; 
Opechancanough  was  taken  prisoner  ; l  and  a  peace  concluded 
with  the  savages,  which  endured  for  many  years. 

It  was  happy  for  Virginia  that  the  restitution  of  her  domes 
tic  liberties  was  accomplished  in  this  manner,  and  not  deferred 
till  a  later  period,  when  the  boon  would  probably  have  been 
attended  with  the  reestablishment  of  the  company  of  patentees. 
To  this  consummation  some  of  the  members  of  the  suppressed 
company  had  been  eagerly  looking  forward  ;  and  notwithstand 
ing  the  disappointment  inflicted  on  their  hopes  by  the  redress 
of  those  grievances  whose  existence  would  have  aided  their 
pretensions,  they  endeavoured  to  turn  to  their  own  advantage 
the  jealous  avidity  with  which  every  complaint  against  the 
royal  government  was  received  in  the  Long  Parliament,  by 
presenting  a  petition  in  the  name  of  the  assembly  of  Virginia, 

1  Beverley.  It  was  the  intention  of  Sir  William  Berkeley  to  send  this  re 
markable  personage  to  England  ;  but  he  was  shot,  after  being  taken  prisoner, 
by  a  soldier,  in  resentment  of  the  calamities  he  had  inflicted  on  the  province. 
He  lingered  under  the  mortal  wound  for  several  days,  and  continued  proud 
and  stout-hearted  to  the  last.  Indignant  at  the  crowds  who  came  to  gaze  at 
him  on  his  death-bed,  he  exclaimed,  "  If  I  had  taken  Sir  William  Berkeley 
prisoner,  I  would  not  have  exposed  him  as  a  show  to  the  people."  He  would 
probably  have  made  him  expire  under  Indian  torture. 


CHAP.  II.]    VIRGINIA  ESPOUSES  THE  ROYAL  CAUSE.  97 

praying  for  a  restoration  of  the  ancient  patents.  This  petition, 
though  supported  by  some  of  the  colonists,  who  were  justly 
dissatisfied  with  the  discouragement  which  the  Puritan  doctrines, 
and  certain  preachers  of  them  whom  they  had  invited  from 
Massachusetts,1  experienced  from  the  domestic  government  of 
Virginia,  was,  undoubtedly,  not  the  act  of  the  assembly,  nor 
the  expression  of  the  prevailing  sentiment  in  the  colony.  The 
assembly  had  tasted  the  sweets  of  unrestricted  freedom,  and 
were  not  disposed  to  hazard  or  encumber  their  system  of  liber 
ty  by  reattaching  it  to  the  mercantile  corporation  under  which 
it  was  originally  established.  No  sooner  were  they  apprized 
of  the  petition  to  the  House  of  Commons  than  they  transmitted 
an  explicit  disavowal  of  it ;  and  at  the  same  time  presented  an 
address  to  the  king,  acknowledging  his  bounty  and  favor  to 
them,  and  desiring  to  continue  under  his  immediate  protection. 
In  the  fervor  of  their  loyalty,  they  framed  and  published  a 
declaration  [1642],  "  that  they  were  born  under  monarchy, 
and  would  never  degenerate  from  the  condition  of  their  births 
by  being  subject  to  any  other  government."  2 

The  only  misfortune  attending  the  manner  in  which  the  Vir 
ginians  had  regained  their  liberties  was,  that  it  allied  their  par 
tial  regards  to  an  authority  which  was  destined  to  be  over 
thrown  in  the  approaching  civil  war,  and  which  could  no  more 
reward  than  it  deserved  their  allegiance.  During  the  whole 
period  of  the  struggle  between  the  king  and  parliament  in  Eng 
land,  they  remained  unalterably  attached  to  the  royal  cause  ; 
and  after  Charles  the  First  was  beheaded,  and  his  son  driven 
out  of  the  kingdom,  they  acknowledged  the  fugitive  prince  as 
their  sovereign,  and  conducted  the  provincial  government  under 
a  commission  which  he  despatched  to  Sir  William  Berkeley 
from  Breda.3  The  royal  family,  though  they  had  little  oppor 
tunity  during  their  exile  of  cultivating  their  interest  in  the  colo 
ny,  were  not  entirely  regardless  of  it.  [June,  1650.]  Hen 
rietta  Maria,  the  queen-mother,  obtained  the  assistance  of  the 
French  government  to  the  execution  of  a  scheme  projected  by 

1  This  transaction  forms  a  part  of  the  history  of  New  England. 

2  Chalmers.     Gordon's  History  of  America.     Burk. 

3  Hume's  England.     Chalmers.     This  year  a  tract  was  published  at  Lon 
don,  by  one  Edward  Williams,  recommending  the  culture  of  silk  in  Virginia. 

VOL.    I.  13 


98  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

Sir  "William  Davenant,  the  poet,  of  emigrating  in  company 
with  a  large  body  of  artificers  whom  he  collected  in  France, 
and  founding  with  them  a  new  plantation  in  Virginia.  The 
expedition  was  intercepted  by  the  English  fleet ;  and  Dave 
nant,  who  was  taken  prisoner,  owed  the  safety  of  his  life  to 
the  friendship  of  Milton.1 

But  the  parliament,  having  subdued  all  opposition  in  Eng 
land,  was  not  disposed  to  suffer  its  authority  to  be  questioned 
in  Virginia.  Incensed  at  the  open  defiance  of  its  power  in 
this  quarter,  it  issued  an  ordinance  [Oct.  1650],  declaring  that 
the  settlement  of  Virginia,  having  originated  from  the  wealth 
and  population  of  England  and  the  authority  of  the  state,  ought 
to  be  subordinate  to  and  dependent  upon  the  English  com 
monwealth,  and  subject  to  the  legislation  of  parliament ;  that 
the  colonists,  instead  of  rendering  this  dutiful  submission,  had 
audaciously  disclaimed  the  supremacy  of  their  parent  state,  and 
rebelled  against  it  ;  and  that,  consequently,  they  now  deserved 
to  be  regarded  as  notorious  robbers  and  traitors.  Not  only 
was  all  connection  prohibited  with  these  refractory  colonists, 
and  the  council  of  state  empowered  to  send  out  a  fleet  and 
army  to  reduce  them  to  obedience,  but  all  foreign  nations  were 
expressly  interdicted  from  trading  with  any  of  the  English  set 
tlements  in  America.2  It  might  reasonably  be  supposed  that 
this  latter  restriction  would  have  created  a  common  feeling, 
throughout  all  the  English  colonies,  of  opposition  to  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  parent  state.  But  the  colonists  of  Massachu 
setts  \vere  much  more  cordially  united  by  similarity  of  political 
sentiments  and  religious  opinions  with  the  leaders  of  the  Eng 
lish  commonwealth,  than  by  identity  of  commercial  interest 
with  the  inhabitants  of  Virginia.  The  religious  views  that  had 
founded  their  colonial  society  long  regulated  all  its  municipal 

1  Johnson's  Life  of  Milton.    Encyclopaedia  Britannica,  V.  688.     Cowley,  in 
a  poem  addressed  to  Davenant,  exclaims, 

"  Sure  't  was  the  noble  boldness  of  the  Muse 
Did  thy  desire  to  seek  new  worlds  infuse." 

But  the  motive  of  Davenant  is,  perhaps,  better  illustrated  by  the  example  than 
by  the  genius  of  Cowley.  Impatient  of  the  tumultuous  distractions  of  Europe, 
these  votaries  of  the  peaceful  pursuits  of  literature  sighed  for  a  sojourn  in  the 
"  safer  world  "  of  America.  In  the  preface  to  a  volume  of  his  poems,  pub 
lished  in  1656,  Cowley  declares,  that  "  his  desire  had  been  for  some  time 
past,  and  did  still  very  vehemently  continue,  to  retire  himself  to  some  of  the 
American  plantations,  and  to  forsake  this  world  for  ever." 

2  Scobell's  Acts,  1650,  cap.  28. 


CHAP.  II.]         ROYALISTS  IN  VIRGINIA  SUBDUED.  99 

policy,  and  prevailed  over  every  other  consideration.  And  no 
sooner  were  the  people  of  Massachusetts  apprized  of  the  par 
liamentary  ordinance,  than  they  hastened  to  corroborate  its 
prohibition  of  intercourse  with  Virginia,  by  a  corresponding 
enactment  of  their  own  domestic  legislature.1 

The  measures  of  the  republican  rulers  of  England  were  as 
prompt  and  decisive  as  their  language.  They  quickly  de 
spatched  Sir  George  Ayscue  with  an  armament  sufficient  to 
overpower  the  provincial  royalists,  and  extinguish  the  last 
traces  of  living  monarchical  authority  that  still  lingered  in  the 
extremities  of  the  empire.  The  commissioners  who  were  ap 
pointed  to  accompany  this  expedition  received  instructions 
more  creditable  to  the  vigor  than  to  the  moderation  and  hu 
manity  of  the  parliamentary  councils.  They  were  empowered 
to  try,  in  the  first  instance,  the  efficacy  of  pardons  and  other 
conciliatory  propositions  in  reducing  the  colonists  to  obedi 
ence  ;  but  if  their  pacific  overtures  should  prove  ineffectual, 
they  were  directed  then  to  employ  every  species  of  hostile 
operation,  to  set  free  the  servants  and  slaves  of  all  the  planters 
who  continued  refractory,  and  furnish  them  with  arms  to  assist 
in  the  subjugation  of  their  masters.2  This  barbarous  plan  of 
hostility  resembles  less  a  war  than  a  massacre,  and  suggests 
the  painful  reflection,  that  an  assembly  possessed  of  absolute 
power,  and  continually  protesting  that  the  glory  of  God  and  the 
liberty  of  mankind  were  the  chief  ends  for  which  they  assumed 
it,  never  once  projected  the  liberation  of  the  negro  slaves  in 
their  own  dominions,  except  for  the  purpose  of  converting 
them  into  instruments  of  bloodshed,  ravage,  and  conquest. 

The  English  squadron,  after  reducing  the  colonies  in  Bar- 
badoes  and  other  islands  to  the  sway  of  the  commonwealth, 
entered  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake.  [1651.]  Berkeley,  apprized 
of  the  invasion,  hastened  to  engage  the  assistance  of  a  few 
Dutch  ships  which  were  then  trading  to  Virginia,  contrary 
both  to  the  royal  and  the  parliamentary  injunctions,  and  with 
more  courage  than  prudence  prepared  to  oppose  the  invading 
armament ;  but  though  he  was  cordially  supported  by  the  roy 
alists,  who  formed  the  great  majority  of  the  inhabitants,  it  was 

1  Hazard.  *  Thurloe's  State  Papers.    Hazard. 


100  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

evident  that  he  had  undertaken  an  unequal  contest.  Yet  his 
gallant  demonstration  of  resistance,  though  unavailing  to  repel 
the  invaders,  enabled  him  to  procure  to  his  people  favorable 
terms  of  submission.  By  the  articles  of  surrender,  a  complete 
indemnity  was  stipulated  for  all  past  offences  ;  and  the  colo 
nists,  recognizing  the  authority,  were  admitted  into  the  bosom 
of  the  English  commonwealth,  and  expressly  assured  of  an 
equal  participation  in  all  the  civil  rights  of  the  people  of  Eng 
land.  In  particular,  it  was  conditioned  that  the  provincial  as 
sembly  should  retain  its  wonted  functions  ;  and  that  "  the 
people  of  Virginia  shall  have  as  free  trade  as  the  people  of 
England  to  all  places  and  with  all  nations,"  and  "  shall  be 
free  from  all  taxes,  customs,  and  impositions  whatsoever,  with 
out  the  consent  of  their  own  assembly."  Berkeley  disdained 
to  make  any  stipulation  for  himself  with  those  whom  his  prin 
ciples  of  loyalty  taught  him  to  regard  as  usurpers.  Without 
leaving  Virginia,  he  withdrew  to  a  retired  situation,  where  he 
continued  to  reside  as  a  private  individual,  universally  beloved 
and  respected,  till  a  new  revolution  was  to  summon  him  once 
more  to  defy  the  republican  forces  of  England,  and  restore 
the  ascendency  of  royalty  in  the  province.1 

But  it  was  the  dependence,  and  not  the  mere  adherence  of 
the  colonies,  that  the  rulers  of  the  English  commonwealth  were 
desirous  to  obtain  ;  and  their  shameless  disregard  of  the  treaty 
concluded  by  their  own  commissioners  demonstrated  in  a 
striking  manner  with  how  little  equity  absolute  power  is  exer 
cised,  even  by  those  who  have  shown  themselves  most  prompt 
to  resent  the  infliction  of  its  rigor  upon  themselves.  Having 
now  obtained  from  the  colonies  a  recognition  of  the  authority 
which  they  administered,  they  hastened  to  adopt  measures  for 
promoting  their  dependence  on  England,  and  securing  the  ex 
clusive  possession  of  their  increasing  commerce.  With  this 
view,  as  well  as  for  the  purpose  of  provoking  a  quarrel  with 
the  Dutch,  by  aiming  a  blow  at  their  carrying  trade,2  the  par 
liament  not  only  forebore  to  repeal  the  ordinance  of  the  pre 
ceding  year,  which  prohibited  commercial  intercourse  between 
the  English  colonies  and  foreign  states,  but  framed  another 

1  Beverley.    Oldmixon.    Chalmers.    Burk.  z  Hume's  England. 


CHAP.  II.]      NAVIGATION  SYSTEM  OF  ENGLAND.  101 

law  [1652]  which  was  to  introduce  a  new  era  of  commercial 
jurisprudence,  and  to  found  the  celebrated  navigation  system 
of  England.  By  this  remarkable  law,  (of  which  the  general 
policy  was  warmly  commended  in-  th£  parliamentary  "speeches 
and  political  writings  of  the  learned  Selden,)  it  was  enacted 
that  no  production  of  Asia,  Africaner  Aiire#ca:  ?hbuid  *e  im 
ported  into  the  dominions  of  the  commonwealth,  except  in 
vessels  belonging  to  English  owners  or  inhabitants  of  the  English 
colonies,  and  navigated  by  crews  of  which  the  captain  and  the 
majority  of  the  sailors  should  be  Englishmen.1  Willing,  at  the 
same  time,  to  encourage  the  cultivation  of  the  staple  commodity 
of  Virginia,  the  parliament  soon  after  passed  an  act  confirming 
all  the  royal  proclamations  against  planting  tobacco  in  England.2 
This  unjust  restriction  of  the  colonial  traffic,  though  by  no 
means  rigorously  enforced,  tended  to  keep  alive  in  Virginia  the 
attachment  to  the  royal  cause,  which  was  farther  maintained  by 
emigrations  of  the  distressed  cavaliers,  who  resorted  thither  in 
such  numbers,  that  the  population  of  the  colony  amounted  to 
thirty  thousand  persons  at  the  epoch  of  the  Restoration.  But 
Cromwell  had  now  prevailed  over  the  parliament  [1653],  and 
held  the  reins  of  the  commonwealth  in  his  vigorous  hands  ;  and 
though  the  flame  of  discontent  was  secretly  nourished  in  Vir 
ginia  by  the  passions  and  intrigues  of  so  many  cavalier  exiles, 
yet  the  eruption  of  it  was  repressed  by  the  terror  of  his  name, 
and  the  energy  which  he  infused  into  every  department  of  his 
administration.  Other  causes,  too,  which  have  been  long  ob 
scured  by  the "  misrepresentations  of  partial  or  ignorant  histo 
rians,  contributed  to  the  tranquillity  and  security  of  Cromwell's 
dominion  in  Virginia.  For  a  century  and  a  half  it  had  been 
repeatedly  asserted,  without  contradiction,  by  successive  gen 
erations  of  writers,3  that  the  government  of  the  Protector  in 

1  Scobell's  Jets,  1651,  cap.  22.  The  germ  of  this  famous  system  of  policy 
occurs  in  English  legislation  so  early  as  the  year  1381,  when  it  was  enacted 
by  the  statute  of  5  Rich.  II.  cap.  3,  "  that,  to  increase  the  navy  of  England,  no 
goods  or  merchandises  shall  be  either  exported  or  imported  but  only  in  ships 
belonging  to  the  king's  subjects."  This  enactment  was  premature,  and  soon 
fell  into  disuse.  A  bill  proclaiming  its  revival  to  a  limited  extent,  in  1460, 
was  rejected  by  Henry  the  Sixth.  These  measures  were  probably  suggested 
by  the  commercial  policy  of  Aragon.  See  Prescott's  History  of  Ferdinand 
and  Isabella,  Introduct.  §  2. 

*  Scobell's  Jets,  1652,  cap.  2. 

s  Among  whom  we  find  the  respectable  names  of  Beverley,  Oldmixon, 
Chalmers,  Robertson,  and  Gordon. 


102  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

this  province  was  illiberal  and  severe  ;  that  he  appointed  gov 
ernors  whose  dispositions  rendered  them  fit  instruments  of  a 
harsh  policy,  and  yet  frequently  displaced  them  from  distrust 
of  their  ^exclusive  devb.tron  to  his  interest  ;  and  that,  while  he 
indulged  his  favorite  colonists  .of  Massachusetts  with  a  dispen 
sation-  frefii  'the,  oommefcia!  laws  of  the  Long  Parliament,  he 
exacted  the  strictest  compliance  with  them  from  the  Virginians. 
But  the  reputation  of  Cromwell's  colonial  policy  has  been 
triumphantly  vindicated  by  the  intelligent  industry  and  research 
of  a  modern  historian1  of  this  province,  who  has  proved,  be 
yond  the  possibility  of  further  doubt  or  denial,  that  the  treat 
ment  which  the  Virginians  experienced  under  the  protectorate 
was  mild  and  humane  ;  that  their  privileges  were  rather  en 
larged  than  circumscribed  ;  and  that  Cromwell  dignified  his 
usurped  dominion  over  them  by  the  most  liberal  justice  and 
fearless  magnanimity. 

So  far  from  having  regulated  the  appointment  and  dismission 
of  governors  by  the  principles  which  have  been  imputed  to 
him,  he  never  appointed  or  displaced  a  single  governor  of  the 
province  ;  but,  from  the  first,  surrendered  this  branch  of  the 
sovereign's  prerogative  to  the  legislative  assembly  of  a  state 
which  he  knew  to  be  the  resort  of  his  own  most  implacable 
enemies  ;  and  though  he  appears  not  to  have  granted  to  the 
Virginians  an  express  exemption  from  the  commercial  ordi 
nances  of  the  Long  Parliament,  he  suffered  them  practically 
to  indulge  a  total  disregard  of  these  oppressive  restrictions. 
Though  his  government  was  not  fitted  to  inspire  attachment, 
it  seems  to  have  gained  the  esteem  and  approbation  of  impar 
tial  and  considerate  men  in  Virginia,  and  to  have  trained  their 
minds  to  freer  reflection  and  inquiry  than  they  had  ever  before 
entertained  with  respect  to  the  reasonable  objects  and  purposes 
for  which  municipal  governments  are  instituted.  But  from  a 
numerous  and  increasing  party  of  the  inhabitants  of  Virginia 
neither  dispassionate  reflection  nor  impartial  judgment  could 
reasonably  be  expected.  To  many  of  them  the  name  of 
Cromwell  was  associated  with  recollections  of  personal  disap- 

1  Burk.  The  history  of  Virginia  has  derived  the  most  valuable  and  im 
portant  illustration  from  the  industry  and  genius  of  this  writer.  His  style  is 
defaced  by  florid,  meretricious  ornament. 


CHAP.  II.]  REVOLT  OF  VIRGINIA.  103 

pointment  and  humiliation  ;  and  to  all  of  them  it  recalled  the 
ruin  of  their  friends  and  the  death  and  exile  of  their  kings. 
Hatred  and  hope  combined  to  unite  their  hearts  to  the  down 
fall  of  the  protectorate  and  commonwealth  ;  and  as  passionate 
are  much  more  contagious  than  merely  reasonable  sentiments, 
the  public  mind  in  Virginia,  notwithstanding  the  liberality  of 
Cromwell's  administration,  was  strongly  leavened  with  the  wish 
and  expectation  of  change. 

The  Puritan  colonists  of  New  England  had  always  been  the 
objects  of  suspicion  and  dislike  to  a  great  majority  of  the  in 
habitants  of  Virginia  ;  and  the  manifest  partiality  which  Crom 
well  entertained  for  them  now  increased  the  aversion  with 
which  they  were  heretofore  regarded.  New  England  was  gen 
erally  considered  by  the  cavaliers  as  the  centre  and  focus  of 
Puritan  sentiment  and  republican  principle  ;  and,  actuated  partly 
by  religious  and  partly  by  political  feelings,  the  Virginian  cava 
liers  conceived  a  violent  antipathy  against  all  the  doctrines, 
sentiments,  and  practices  that  were  reckoned  peculiar  to  the 
Puritans  ;  and  rejected  all  communication  of  the  knowledge 
that  flourished  in  New  England,  from  hatred  of  the  authority 
under  whose  shelter  it  grew  and  of  the  principles  to  which  it 
administered  support.1  At  length  the  disgust  and  impatience 
of  the  royalist  party  in  Virginia  spurned  further  restraint. 
Matthews,  the  last  governor  appointed  during  the  supremacy 
of  Cromwell  [1658],  died  nearly  at  the  same  period  with  the 
Protector ;  and  before  an  assembly  could  be  convened  to 
nominate  his  successor,  a  numerous  body  of  the  inhabitants, 
though  yet  unacquainted  with  Cromwell's  death,  assembled  in 
a  tumultuous  manner,  and,  having  forced  Sir  William  Berkeley 
from  his  retirement,  declared  him  the  only  governor  whom 
they  would  acknowledge  in  Virginia.2  Berkeley  declining  to 

1  The  prejudices  of  an  old  cavalier  against  popular  education  are  strikingly 
displayed  by  Sir  William  Berkeley,  in  a  letter  descriptive  of  the  state  of  Vir 
ginia,  some  years  after  the  Restoration.     "  I  thank  God,"  he  says,  "  there  are 
no  free  schools  nor  printing ;  and  I  hope  we  shall  not  have  them  these  hun 
dred  years.     For  learning  has  brought  neresy  and  disobedience  and  sects  into 
the  world,  and  printing  has  divulged  them,  and  libels  against  the  best  govern 
ment  :  God  keep  us  from  both  !  "  —  Chalmers. 

2  That  Cromwell  meditated  some  important  changes  in  Virginia,  which 
death  prevented  him  from  attempting  to  accomplish,  may  be  inferred  from  the 
publication  of  a  small  treatise  at  London  in  the  year  1657,  entitled  "  Public 
Good  without  Private  Interest,"  written  by  Dr.  Gatford,  and  dedicated  to  the 
Protector.     In  this  little  work,  the  Protector  is  urged  to  reform  the  numerous 


104  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

act  under  usurped  authority,  the  insurgents  venturously  erected 
the  royal  standard,  and  proclaimed  Charles  the  Second  to  be 
their  lawful  sovereign  ;  a  measure  which  entailed  apparently  a 
contest  with  the  arms  of  Cromwell  and  all  the  force  of  the 
parent  state.  Happily  for  the  colonists,  the  distractions  that 
ensued  in  England  deferred  the  vengeance  which  her  rulers 
had  equal  ability  and  inclination  to  inflict,  till  the  sudden  and 
unexpected  restoration  of  Charles  to  the  throne  of  his  ances 
tors  [1660]  converted  imprudent  temerity  into  meritorious 
service,  and  enabled  the  Virginians  safely  to  exult  in  the 
singularity  which  they  long  and  proudly  commemorated,  that 
they  were  the  last  of  the  British  subjects  who  renounced,  and 
the  first  who  resumed,  their  allegiance  to  the  crown.1 

abuses  extant  in  Virginia,  —  the  disregard  of  religion,  —  the  neglect  of  edu 
cation,  —  and  the  fraudulent  dealings  of  the  planters  with  the  Indians  ;  on  all 
which  topics  the  author  descants  very  forcibly.  Of  this  treatise,  as  well  as  of 
the  tracts  by  Hamer  and  Williams  and  some  others,  which  I  have  had  occa 
sion  to  notice  elsewhere,  I  found  copies  in  the  library  of  the  late  George 
Chalmers. 
1  Oldmixon.  Beverley.  Chalmers.  Burk.  Campbell. 


CHAP.  III.]       RESTORATION  OF  THE  STUARTS.  105 


CHAPTER    III. 

The  Navigation  Act  —  its  Impolicy.  —  Discontent  and  Distress  of  the  Colo 
nists.  —  Naturalization  of  Aliens.  —  Progress  of  the  provincial  Discontent. 

—  Indian  Hostilities. —  Bacon's  Rebellion.  —  Death  of  Bacon  —  and  Resto 
ration  of  Tranquillity. —  Bill  of  Attainder  passed  by  the  colonial  Assembly. 

—  Sir  William  Berkeley  superseded  by  Colonel  Jeffreys.  —  Partiality  of  the 
new  Governor  —  Dispute  with  the  Assembly.  —  Renewal  of  Discontents. 

—  Lord  Culpepper  appointed  Governor  —  Severity  and  Rapacity  of  his  Ad 
ministration.  —  An  Insurrection  —  Punishment  of  the  Insurgents.  —  Arbi 
trary  Measures  of  the  Crown.  —  James  the  Second  —  augments  the  Burdens 
of  the  Colonists.  —  Corrupt  and  oppressive  Government  of  Lord  Effingham. 

—  Revolution  in  Britain.  —  Complaints  of  the  Colonies  against  the  former 
Governors  discouraged  by  King  William.  —  Effect  of  the  English  Revolu 
tion  on  the  American  Colonies.  —  State  of  Virginia  at  this  Period  —  Popu 
lation  —  Laws  —  Manners. 

THE  intelligence  of  the  restoration  of  the  House  of  Stuart 
to  the  throne  of  Britain  excited  very  different  emotions  in  the 
various  British  colonies  which  were  now  established  in  Amer 
ica.  We  shall  have  occasion  hereafter  to  notice  the  gloomy 
impressions  it  produced  in  the  States  of  New  England.  In 
Virginia,  whose  separate  history  we  still  exclusively  pursue, 
it  was  received  by  a  great  majority  of  the  people  like  the  sur 
prising  fulfilment  of  an  agreeable  dream,  and  hailed  with  ac 
clamations  of  unfeigned  and  unbounded  joy.  Even  that  class 
of  the  inhabitants,  which  had  recently  expressed  esteem  and 
approbation  of  the  protectoral  government,  manifested  a  new 
born  zeal  for  royalty  hardly  inferior  to  the  more  consistent 
ardor  of  the  genuine  cavaliers.  These  sentiments,  confirmed 
by  the  gracious  expressions  of  regard  and  good-will l  which  the 

1  Sir  William  Berkeley,  who  made  a  journey  to  England  to  congratulate 
the  king  on  his  restoration,  was  received  at  court  with  distinguished  regard  ; 
and  Charles,  in  honor  of  his  loyal  Virginians,  wore  at  his  coronation  a  robe 
manufactured  of  Virginian  silk.  —  Oldmixon. 

This  was  not  the  first  royal  robe  that  America  supplied.  Queen  Elizabeth 
wore  a  gown  made  of  the  silk  grass,  of  which  Raleign's  colonists  sent  a  quan 
tity  to  England.  —  Coxe's  Description  of  Carolana.  There  is  a  copy  of  this 
curious  work  in  the  library  of  the  Royal  Institution  of  Great  Britain. 

VOL.    I.  14 


106  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

king  very  readily  vouchsafed,  begot  hopes  of  substantial  favor 
and  recompense  which  it  was  not  easy  to  gratify,  and  which 
were  fated  to  undergo  a  speedy  and  severe  disappointment. 
Sir  William  Berkeley,  having  received  a  new  commission  from 
the  crown  to  exercise  the  office  of  governor  [1660],  convoked 
the  provincial  assembly,  which,  after  zealous  declarations  of 
loyalty  and  satisfaction,  undertook  a  general  revision  of  the 
laws  and  institutions  of  Virginia.  Trial  by  jury,  which  had 
been  discontinued  for  some  years,  was  now  again  restored  ; 
judicial  procedure  was  disencumbered  of  various  abuses  ;  and 
a  provision  of  essential  importance  to  the  interests  of  liberty 
was  made  for  enlarging  the  number  of  representatives  in  the 
assembly  in  proportion  to  the  increase  of  the  province  in 
peopled  and  cultivated  territory.  The  supremacy  of  the  church 
of  England  was  recognized  and  established  by  law  ;  stipends 
were  allotted  to  its  ministers  ;  and  no  preachers  but  those  who 
had  received  their  ordination  from  a  bishop  in  England,  and 
who  should  subscribe  an  engagement  of  conformity  to  the 
forms  and  constitutions  of  this  established  church,  were  per 
mitted  to  exercise  their  functions  either  publicly  or  privately 
within  the  colony.1  A  law  was  shortly  after  enacted  against 
the  importation  of  Quakers  into  Virginia,  under  the  penalty  of 
five  thousand  pounds  of  tobacco  inflicted  on  the  importers  ; 
but  with  a  special  exception  of  such  Quakers  as  might  be  judi 
cially  transported  from  England  for  breach  of  her  legislative 
ordinances.2 

The  same  principles  of  government  which  prevailed  in  Eng 
land  after  the  Restoration  uniformly  extended  their  influence, 
whether  salutary  or  baneful,  across  the  Atlantic  ;  and  the 
colonies,  no  longer  deemed  the  mere  property  of  the  prince, 
were  considered  as  adjunctions  of  the  British  territory,  and 
subject  to  parliamentary  legislation.  The  explicit  declaration 
by  the  Long  Parliament  of  the  dependence  of  the  colonies  on 
the  parent  state  introduced  maxims  which  received  the  sanc 
tion  of  the  courts  of  Westminster  Hall,  and  were  thus  inter 
woven  with  the  fabric  of  English  law.  In  a  variety  of  cases 

1  Chalmers.     Burk. 

2  Chalmers.     In  1663,  the  assembly  entertained  a  complaint  against  one  of 
its  own  members,  of  "  being  loving  to  the  Quakers."  —  Burk. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE  NAVIGATION  ACT.  107 

which  involved  this  great  constitutional  point,  the  judges  pro 
nounced,  that,  by  virtue  of  those  principles  of  the  common  law 
which  bind  the  territories  to  the  state,  the  American  planta 
tions  were  included  within  the  pale  of  British  dominion  and 
legislation,  and  affected  by  acts  of  parliament,  either  when 
specially  named  or  when  reasonably  supposable  within  the  con 
templation  of  the  legislature.1  In  conformity  with  the  adjudi 
cations  of  the  courts  of  law  was  the  uniform  tenor  of  the 
parliamentary  proceedings  ;  and  the  colonists  soon  perceived, 
that,  although  the  Long  Parliament  was  no  more,  it  had  be 
queathed  to  its  successors  the  spirit  which  influenced  its  com 
mercial  councils.  The  new  House  of  Commons  determined 
not  only  to  retain  the  system  of  colonial  policy  which  the  Long 
Parliament  had  introduced,  but  to  mature  and  extend  it,  —  to 
render  the  trade  of  the  colonies  completely  subject  to  parlia 
mentary  governance,  and  exclusively  subservient  to  the  inter 
ests  of  English  commerce  and  navigation. 

No  sooner  was  Charles  seated  on  the  throne,  than  a  duty  of 
five  per  cent,  was  imposed  by  the  parliament  on  all  merchan 
dise  exported  from,  or  imported  into,  any  of  the  dominions 
belonging  to  the  crown  ; 2  and  the  same  session,  in  producing 
the1  celebrated  Navigation  Act  [1660],  originated  the  most 
memorable  and  important  branch  of  the  commercial  code  of 
England.  By  this  statute,  (in  addition  to  many  other  impor 
tant  provisions,  which  are  foreign  to  our  present  consideration,) 
it  was  ordained,  that  no  commodities  should  be  imported  into 
any  British  settlement  in  Asia,  Africa,  or  America,  or  exported 
from  thence,  but  in  vessels  built  in  England  or  her  colonial 
plantations,  and  navigated  by  crews  of  which  the  masters  and 
three  fourths  of  the  mariners  should  be  English  subjects,  under 
the  penalty  of  forfeiture  of  ship  and  cargo  ;  that  none  but 
natural-born  subjects  of  the  English  crown,  or  persons  legally 
naturalized,  should  exercise  the  occupation  of  merchant  or 
factor  in  any  English  colonial  settlement,  under  the  penalty  of 
forfeiture  of  goods  and  chattels  ;  that  no  sugar,  tobacco,  cot 
ton,  wool,  indigo,  ginger,  or  woods  used  in  dyeing,  produced 

1  Freeman's  Reports,  175.  Modern  Reports,  III.  159, 160,  IV.  225.  Vaughan's 
Reports,  170,  400.     Salkeld's  Reports,  II.  6. 
»  12  Car.  II.  cap.  4. 


108  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

or  manufactured  in  the  colonies,  should  be  shipped  from  them 
to  any  other  country  than  England  ;  and  to  secure  the  obser 
vance  of  this  regulation,  ship-owners  were  required,  at  the  port 
of  lading,  to  give  bonds  with  surety  for  sums  proportioned  to 
the  tonnage  of  their  vessels.1  The  commercial  wares  thus  re 
stricted  were  termed  enumerated  commodities ;  and  when  new 
articles  of  colonial  produce,  as  the  rice  of  Carolina  and  the 
copper  ore  of  the  northern  provinces,  were  raised  into  impor 
tance,  and  brought  into  commerce  by  the  increasing  industry  of 
the  colonists,  they  were  successively  added  to  the  original  list 
which  we  have  noted,  and  subjected  to  the  same  regulations. 

As  some  compensation  to  the  colonies  for  these  commercial 
restraints,  the  parliament  at  the  same  time  conferred  on  them 
the  exclusive  supply  of  tobacco,  by  prohibiting  its  cultivation 
in  England,  Ireland,  Guernsey,  and  Jersey.2  The  Navigation 
Act  was  soon  after  enlarged,  and  additional  restrictions  imposed 
by  a  new  law  [1663],  which  prohibited  the  importation  of 
European  commodities  into  the  colonies,  except  in  vessels 
laden  in  England  and  navigated  and  manned  in  conformity  with 
the  requisitions  of  the  original  statute.  More  rigorous  and 
effectual  provisions  were  likewise  devised  for  securing  the  in 
fliction  of  the  penalties  attached  to  the  transgression  of  the 
Navigation  Act  ;  and  the  principles  of  commercial  policy  on 
which  the  whole  system  was  founded  were  openly  avowed  in 
a  declaration,  that,  as  it  was  the  practice  of  other  nations  to 
keep  the  trade  of  their  plantations  to  themselves,  so  the  colo 
nies  that  were  founded  and  peopled  by  English  subjects  ought 
to  be  retained  in  firm  dependence  upon  England,  and  obliged 
to  contribute  to  her  advantage  in  the  employment  of  English 
shipping,  the  vent  of  English  commodities  and  manufactures, 
and  the  conversion  of  England  into  a  settled  mart  or  empo 
rium,  not  only  of  the  productions  of  her  own  colonies,  but  also 
of  such  commodities  of  other  countries  as  the  colonies  them 
selves  might  require  to  be  supplied  with.3  Advancing  a  step 
farther  in  the  prosecution  of  its  domineering  policy,  the  parlia 
ment  assumed  the  prerogative  of  regulating  the  trade  of  the 
several  colonies  with  each  other  ;  and  as  the  Act  of  Navigation 

1  12  Car.  II.  cap.  18.  2  Ibid.  cap.  34.  3  15  Car.  II.  cap.  7. 


CHAP.  III.]     IMPOLICY  OF  THE  EXCLUSIVE  SYSTEM.  109 

had  left  all  the  colonists  at  liberty  to  export  the  enumerated 
commodities  from  one  settlement  to  another  without  paying 
any  duty,  this  exemption  was  subsequently  withdrawn,  and 
they  were  subjected,  in  trading  with  each  other,  to  a  tax  equiv 
alent  to  what  was  levied  on  the  consumption  of  their  peculiar 
commodities  in  England.1 

The  system  pursued  by  these  regulations,  of  securing  to 
England  a  monopoly  of  the  trade  of  her  colonies,  by  shutting 
up  every  other  channel  which  competition  might  have  formed 
for  it,  and  into  which  the  interest  of  the  colonists  might  have 
caused  it  preferably  to  flow,  excited  in  their  minds  the  utmost 
disgust  and  indignation.  In  England,  it  was  long  applauded 
as  a  masterpiece  of  political  sagacity  ;  retained  and  cherished 
as  a  main  source  of  national  opulence  and  power  ;  and  de 
fended  on  the  plea  of  expediency,  deduced  from  its  supposed 
advantages.  The  philosophy  of  political  science,  however, 
has  amply  refuted  these  illiberal  principles,  and  would  long 
ago  have  corrected  the  views  and  amended  the  institutions 
which  they  sanctioned  or  introduced,  but  that,  from  the  general 
prevalence  of  narrow  jealousies,  and  of  those  obstinate  and 
violent  prepossessions  that  constitute  wilful  ignorance,  the 
cultivation  of  political  science  has  much  more  frequently  ter 
minated  in  knowledge  merely  speculative,  than  visibly  operated 
to  improve  human  conduct,  or  increase  human  happiness. 

Nations,  biased  by  virulent  enmities,  as  well  as  mean  par 
tialities,  have  suffered  an  illiberal  jealousy  of  other  states  to 
contract  the  views  they  have  formed  of  their  own  interests, 
and  to  induce  a  line  of  policy,  of  which  the  operation  is  to  pro 
cure  a  smaller  amount  of  exclusive  gain,  in  preference  to  a 
larger  contingent  in  the  participation  of  general  advantage. 
Too  passionate  or  gross-sighted  to  discern  the  bonds  that  con 
nect  the  interests  of  ah1  the  members  of  the  great  family  of 
mankind,  they  have  accounted  the  detriment  and  exclusion  of 
their  rivals  equivalent  to  an  extension  of  benefit  to  themselves. 
The  prevalence  of  this  mistaken  policy  has  commonly  been 
aided  by  the  interested  representations  of  the  few  who  contrive 
to  extract  a  temporary  and  partial  advantage  from  every  abuse, 

1  25  Car.  II.  cap.  7,  Anno  1672. 


110  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

however  generally  pernicious  ;  and  when,  in  spite  of  a  faulty 
commercial  system,  the  prosperity  of  a  state  has  been  augment 
ed  by  the  force  of  its  natural  advantages,  this  effect  has  been 
eagerly  ascribed  to  the  very  causes  which  really  impeded  and 
abridged,  without  being  able  entirely  to  intercept  it.  But  the 
discoveries  obtained  by  the  cultivation  of  political  science  have, 
in  this  respect,  coincided  with  the  dictates  of  Christian  mo 
rality,  and  demonstrated,  that,  in  every  transaction  between  na 
tions  and  individuals,  the  intercourse  most  solidly  and  lastingly 
beneficial  to  both  and  each  of  the  parties  is  that  which  is  found 
ed  on  the  principles  of  fair  reciprocity  and  mutual  accommo 
dation  ;  that  all  policy  suggested  by  jealous  or  malevolent  re 
gard  of  the  advantage  of  others  implies  a  narrow  and  perverted 
view  of  our  own  ;  that  that  which  is  morally  wrong  can  never 
be  politically  right  ;  and  that  to  do  as  we  would  be  done  by 
is  not  less  the  maxim  of  prudence  than  the  precept  of  piety. 
So  coherent  must  true  philosophy  ever  be  with  the  prescrip 
tions  of  divine  wisdom.  But,  unfortunately,  this  coherence  has 
not  always  been  recognized  even  by  those  philosophers  whose 
researches  have  tended  to  its  illustration  ;  and  confining  them 
selves  to  reasonings  sufficiently  clear  and  convincing,  no  doubt, 
to  persons  contemplating  human  affairs  in  the  simplicity  and 
disinterested  abstraction  of  theoretical  survey,  they  have  neg 
lected  to  promote  the  acceptance  of  important  truths  by  refer 
ence  to  those  principles  that  derive  them  from  infallible  wis 
dom,  and  connect  them  with  the  strongest  sanctions  of  human 
duty. 

They  have  demonstrated :  that  a  parent  state,  by  restraining 
the  commerce  of  her  colonies  with  other  nations,  impairs  the 
industry  and  productiveness  both  of  the  colonies  and  of  foreign 
nations  ;  and  hence,  by  enfeebling  the  demand  of  foreign  pur 
chasers,  which  must  be  proportioned  to  their  ability,  and  les 
sening  the  quantity  of  colonial  commodities  actually  produced, 
which  must  be  proportioned  to  the  actual  demand  for  them, 
enhances  the  price  of  the  colonial  produce  to  herself  as  well  as 
to  the  rest  of  the  world,  and  so  far  diminishes  its  power  to  in 
crease  the  enjoyments  and  animate  the  industry  of  her  own 

1  Smith's  Wealth  of  Nations. 


CHAP.   III.]     IMPOLICY  OF  THE  EXCLUSIVE  SYSTEM.        Ill 

citizens  as  well  as  of  other  states.  Besides,  the  monopoly  of 
the  colonial  trade  produces  so  high  a  rate  of  profit  to  the 
merchants  who  carry  it  on,  as  to  attract  into  this  channel  a 
great  deal  of  the  capital  that  would,  in  the  natural  course  of 
things,  be  directed  to  other  branches  of  trade  ;  and  in  these 
branches  the  profits  must  consequently  be  augmented  in  pro 
portion  to  the  diminished  competition  of  the  capitals  employed 
in  them.  But  whenever  the  ordinary  rate  of  profit  in  any 
country  is  raised  by  artificial  means  to  a  higher  pitch  than  it 
would  naturally  attain,  that  country  is  necessarily  subjected  to 
great  disadvantage  in  every  branch  of  trade  of  which  she  does 
not  command  a  monopoly.  Her  merchants  cannot  obtain  such 
higher  profit  without  selling  dearer  than  they  otherwise  would 
do  both  the  commodities  of  foreign  countries  which  they  im 
port  into  their  own,  and  the  goods  of  their  own  country  which 
they  carry  abroad.  The  country  thus  finds  herself  undersold 
at  foreign  markets  in  many  branches  of  commerce  ;  a  disad 
vantage  to  which  she  is  the  more  exposed,  that  in  foreign 
states  much  capital  has  been  forced  into  those  branches  by  her 
exclusion  of  foreigners  from  partaking  her  colonial  trade,  which 
would  have  absorbed  a  part  of  it.  Thus,  by  the  operation  of 
a  monopoly  of  the  colonial  trade,  the  parent  state  obtains  an 
overgrowth  of  one  branch  of  distant  traffic,  at  the  expense  of 
diminishing  the  advantages  which  her  own  citizens  might  derive 
from  the  unrestricted  produce  of  the  colonies,  and  of  impair 
ing  all  those  branches  of  nearer  trade,  which,  by  the  greater 
frequency  of  their  returns,  afford  the  most  constant  and  bene 
ficial  excitement  to  national  industry.  Her  commerce,  instead 
of  flowing  in  a  variety  of  moderate  channels,  is  trained  to  seek 
principally  one  great  conduit  ;  and  hence  the  whole  system  of 
her  trade  and  industry  is  rendered  dangerously  liable  to  ob 
struction  and  derangement. 

But  the  injurious  consequences  of  this  exclusive  policy  are 
not  confined  to  its  immediate  operation  upon  trade.  The  pro 
gress  of  our  history  will  demonstrate,  that  the  connection,  which 
a  parent  state  seeks,  by  the  aid  of  such  a  system,  to  maintain 
with  colonies  in  which  the  spirit  and  institutions  of  liberty  ob 
tain  any  prevalence,  carries  within  itself  the  principles  of  its 
own  dissolution.  During  the  infancy  of  the  colonies,  a  per- 


112  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

petual  and  vexatious  exertion  is  required  from  the  parent  state 
to  execute  and  develope  her  restraining  laws  ;  while  a  corre 
sponding  activity  is  awakened  in  the  colonies  to  obstruct  or 
elude  their  operation.  Every  rising  branch  of  trade,  which  is 
left,  for  a  time  or  for  ever,  free  to  the  colonists,  serves,  by  the 
effect  of  contrast,  to  render  more  striking  and  sensible  the  dis 
advantages  of  their  situation  in  the  regulated  branches  ;  and 
every  extension  of  the  restrictions  provokes  additional  discon 
tent.  As  the  colonies  increase  their  internal  strength,  and 
make  advances  in  the  possession  and  appreciation  of  social  im 
portance,  the  disposition  of  their  inhabitants  to  emancipate 
themselves  from  such  restraints  is  combined  with  ability  to  ac 
complish  their  deliverance,  by  the  very  circumstances  and  at. 
the  very  period  which  will  expose  the  trade  of  the  parent  state 
to  the  greatest  injury  and  disorder.  And  the  advantages  which 
the  commerce  of  other  nations  must  expect  from  the  destruc 
tion  of  the  monopoly  unites  the  wishes  of  the  whole  world  with 
the  revolt  of  the  colonies,  and  gives  assurance  of  the  most 
powerful  assistance  to  promote  their  emancipation. 

A  better  apology  for  the  system  which  England  adopted  to 
wards  her  colonies,  than  the  boasted  expediency  of  her  meas 
ures  would  thus  appear  to  supply,  may  be  derived  from  the 
admitted  fact,  that  her  colonial  policy,  on  the  whole,  was  much 
less  illiberal  and  oppressive  than  that  which  any  other  nation 
of  Europe  had  ever  been  known  to  pursue.  While  the  foreign 
trade  of  the  colonies  was  restrained  for  the  supposed  advan 
tage  of  England,  whose  prosperity  they  partook,  and  by  whose 
power  they  were  or  were  supposed  to  be  defended,  their  in 
ternal  liberty  was  in  the  main  suffered  to  flourish  and  mature 
itself  under  the  shelter  of  wise  and  liberal  domestic  institutions  ; 
and  even  the  commercial  restrictions  imposed  on  them  were 
much  less  rigorous  and  injurious  than  those  which  the  colonies 
of  France,  Spain,  Portugal,  and  Denmark  endured  from  their 
respective  parent  states.  The  trade  of  the  British  settlements 
was  not  committed,  according  to  the  practice  of  some  of  those 
states,  to  exclusive  companies,  nor  restricted,  according  to  the 
practice  of  others,  to  a  particular  port  ;  but,  being  left  free  to 
all  the  people,  and  admitted  to  all  the  harbours  of  England, 
employed  a  body  of  British  traders  too  numerous  and  dis- 


CHAP.  III.]     THE  NAVIGATION  ACT  A  GRIEVANCE.  113 

persed  to  admit  of  their  renouncing  mutual  competition  and 
uniting  in  a  general  confederacy  to  oppress  the  colonists  and- 
extort  exorbitant  profits  to  themselves.  This  apology  is  ob 
viously  very  unsatisfactory,  as  every  attempt  to  palliate  injus 
tice  must  necessarily  be.  It  was  urged  with  a  very  bad  grace 
by  the  people  of  England,  and  totally  disregarded  by  the  in 
habitants  of  America. 

In  none  of  the  American  colonies  did  this  tyrannical  system 
excite  greater  resentment  than  in  Virginia,  where  the  larger 
commerce  of  the  people,  their  preeminent  loyalty,  and  the  re 
cent  experience  of  the  lenient  and  liberal  policy  of  Cromwell, 
rendered  the  pressure  of  the  burden  more  severe,  and  the  in 
fliction  of  it  more  exasperating.1  No  sooner  was  the  Naviga 
tion  Act  promulgated  in  Virginia,  and  its  effects  perceived,  than 
the  colonists  warmly  remonstrated  against  it  as  a  grievance, 
and  petitioned  earnestly  for  relief.  But,  although  the  English 
monarchs  were  accustomed  at  this  period  to  exercise  a  dis 
pensing  power  over  the  laws,  —  insomuch,  that,  when  the  court 
at  a  later  period  ventured  openly  to  pursue  a  system  of  arbi 
trary  government,  even  the  Act  of  Navigation  itself,  so  great  a 
favorite  with  the  nation,  was  suspended  for  a  while  by  an  exer 
tion  of  this  stretch  of  prerogative,  —  yet,  during  the  early  pe 
riod  of  his  reign,  Charles,  unassured  of  the  stability  of  his 
throne,  and  surrounded  by  ministers  of  constitutional  principles, 
was  compelled  to  observe  the  limits  of  a  legal  administration, 
and  to  aid  with  his  authority  the  execution  even  of  those  laws 
that  were  most  repugnant  to  his  principles  and  wishes.2  So 

1  It  was  to  Virginia  alone  that  Montesquieu's  justificatory  principle  of  the 
system  of  restricted  trade  could  be  considered  as  in  any  degree  applicable. 
"  It  has  been  established,"  says  this  writer,  "  that  the  mother  country  alone 
shall  trade  in  the  colonies,  and  that  from  very  good  reason,  —  because  the  design 
of  the  settlement  was  the  extension  of  commerce,  and  not  the  foundation  of  a 
city  or  of  a  new  empire."  —  Spirit  of  Laws.  This  was  in  some  measure  true 
in  regard  to  Virginia,  though  her  first  charter  professes  more  enlarged  designs ; 
but  it  was  not  applicable  to  New  England,  Maryland,  or  the  other  posterior 
settlements  of  the  English. 

8  When  the  parliament,  in  1666,  proposed  the  unjust  and  violent  law,  which 
they  finally  established,  against  the  importation  of  Irish  cattle  into  England, 
the  king  was  so  much  struck  with  the  remonstrances  of  the  Irish  people 
against  this  measure,  that  he  not  only  exerted  all  his  interest  to  oppose  the 
bill,  but  openly  declared  that  he  could  not  conscientiously  assent  to  it ;  but  the 
Commons  were  inflexible  in  their  purpose,  and  the  king  was  compelled  to 
submit.  "  The  spirit  of  tyranny,"  says  Hume,  "  of  which  nations  are  as  sus 
ceptible  as  individuals,  had  extremely  animated  the  English  to  exert  their  au 
thority  over  their  dependent  state." 

VOL.    I.  15 


114  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

far  from  lending  a  favorable  ear  to  the  petition  of  Virginia, 
Charles  and  his  ministers  adopted  measures  for  carrying  the 
act  into  strict  execution.  Intelligence  having  been  received 
that  its  provisions  were  violated  almost  as  generally  as  they 
were  detested,  and  that  the  provincial  authorities  were  reluctant 
to  promote  the  efficacy  of  a  system  which  they  perceived  was 
so  hateful  to  the  persons  over  whom  they  presided, — a  royal 
mandate  was  issued  to  the  governors  of  the  settlements,  repri 
manding  them  for  the  "  neglects,  or  rather  contempts,"  which 
the  law  had  sustained,  and  enjoining  their  future  attention  to 
its  rigid  enforcement  ; l  and  in  Virginia,  more  especially,  de 
monstration  was  made  of  the  determined  purpose  of  the  Eng 
lish  government  to  overcome  all  provincial  resistance,  by  the 
erection  of  forts  on  the  banks  of  the  principal  rivers,  and  the 
appointment  of  vessels  to  cruise  on  the  coasts.  But,  notwith 
standing  the  threatening  measures  employed  to  overawe  them, 
and  the  vigilance  of  the  British  cruisers,  the  Virginians  con 
trived  to  evade  the  law,  and  to  obtain  some  vent  to  the  accu 
mulating  stores  of  their  depreciated  produce,  by  a  clandestine 
traffic  with  the  settlement  of  the  Dutch  on  Hudson's  River. 
This  relief,  however,  was  inconsiderable  ;  and  the  discontent 
of  the  planters,  inflamed  by  the  hostilities  which  the  frontier 
Indians  now  resumed,  began  to  spread  so  widely  as  to  inspire 
some  veteran  soldiers  of  Cromwell,  who  had  been  banished  to 
Virginia,  with  the  hope  of  rendering  themselves  masters  of  the 
colony,  and  delivering  it  entirely  from  the  yoke  of  England. 
A  conspiracy,  which  has  received  the  name  of  Birkinhead's 
Plot,  was  formed  for  this  purpose  ;  but  the  design,  having  been 
seasonably  disclosed  by  the  fear  or  remorse  of  one  of  the  per 
sons  engaged  in  it,  was  easily  defeated  by  the  prudence  and 
vigor  of  Sir  William  Berkeley,  and  with  no  farther  bloodshed 
than  the  execution  of  four  of  the  conspirators.2 

The  distress  of  the  colony  continuing  to  increase  with  the 
increasing  depreciation  of  tobacco,  now  confined  almost  entire 
ly  to  one  market,  and  with  the  augmentation  of  the  price  of  all 
foreign  commodities,  now  derivable  only  from  the  supplies 
which  one  country  could  furnish,  —  various  efforts  were  made 
from  time  to  time  by  the  provincial  assembly  for  the  relief  of 

I  Chalmers.     State  Papers,  ibid.  *  Oldmixon.     Beverley.     Burk. 


CHAP    III.]          NATURALIZATION  OF  ALIENS.  115 

their  constituents.  Retaliating,  in  some  degree,  the  injustice 
with  which  they  were  treated,  they  framed  a  law  ordaining, 
that,  in  the  payment  of  debts,  foreign  creditors  should  be  post 
poned  to  Virginian  claimants,  and  that  the  provincial  tribunals 
should  give  precedence  in  judgments  to  engagements  contract 
ed  within  the  colony.  Statutes  were  enacted  for  restraining  the 
culture  of  tobacco  ;  and  attempts  were  made  to  introduce  a 
new  staple,  by  encouraging  the  plantation  of  mulberry-trees 
and  the  manufacture  of  silk  ;  but  neither  of  these  projects  was 
successful.  Numerous  French  Protestant  refugees  being  at 
tracted  to  Maryland  by  a  statute  of  naturalization  in  their  favor, 
which  was  enacted  in  this  province  in  the  year  1666,  the  Vir 
ginian  assembly  endeavoured  to  recruit  the  wealth  and  popula 
tion  of  its  territories  from  the  same  source,  by  framing,  in  like 
manner,  a  series  of  laws  which  empowered  the  governor  to 
confer  on  aliens  taking  the  oath  of  allegiance  all  the  privileges 
of  naturalization  [1671]  ; 1  but  it  was  provisionally  subjoined, 
that  this  concession  should  not  be  construed  to  vest  aliens  with 
the  power  of  exercising  any  function  which  they  were  disabled 
from  performing  by  the  statutes  of  the  English  parliament  rela 
tive  to  the  colonies.  This  prudent  reference  to  a  restriction 
which  the  provincial  patents  of  naturalization  must  inevitably 
have  received  from  the  common  law  was  intended  to  guard 
against  the  disputes  and  confiscations  which  might  ensue  from 
the  attempts  of  naturalized  aliens  to  infringe  the  Navigation  Act. 
But  the  precaution  was  unavailing  ;  and  at  an  after  period 

1  It  was  not  till  after  the  Revolution  of  1688  that  the  population  of  Virginia 
received  any  accession  from  the  influx  of  these  or  other  foreigners.  In  1671, 
Sir  William  Berkeley  thus  describes  the  state  of  its  population  :  —  "  There 
are  in  Virginia  above  40,000  persons,  men,  women,  and  children  ;  of  which 
there  are  2,000  black  slaves,  6,000  Christian  servants  for  a  short  time,  and  the 
rest  have  been  born  in  the  country,  or  have  come  in  to  settle  or  serve  in  hope 
of  bettering  their  condition  in  a  growing  country.  Yearly,  we  suppose,  there 
come  in  of  servants  about  1,500,  of  which  most  are  English,  few  Scotch,  and 
fewer  Irish  ;  and  not  above  two  or  three  ships  of  negroes  in  seven  years."  — 
Answers  to  the  Lords  of  the  Committee  of  Colonies,  amid  Chalmers.  The 
numerous  importations  of  servants  mentioned  by  Sir  William  Berkeley  were 
probably  checked  by  the  troubles  that  preceded  and  attended  Bacon's  Rebel 
lion.  The  later  importations  were  more  available  than  the  earlier  ones  ;  the 
diseases  of  the  country  having  diminished  in  frequency  and  violence  as  the 
woods  were  progressively  cut  down ;  diseases  occasioned  by  the  repugnance 
of  the  human  constitution  to  novelty  of  climate  were  diminished  by  the  lapse 
of  time  and  the  consequent  gradual  compliance  of  the  bodily  frame  with  the 
properties  of  the  region.  The  mortality  among  the  new  comers,  we  learn 
from  Sir  William  Berkeley,  was  at  first  enormous,  but  had  become  very 
trifling  prior  to  1671. 


116  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

many  forfeitures  of  property  were  occasioned,  and  much  ju 
dicial  controversy  produced,  by  the  traffic  which  aliens  in  the 
colonies  carried  on  under  the  authority  of  general  patents  of 
denization  granted  to  them  by  the  ignorance  or  inattention  of 
the  royal  governors.  Their  pretensions,  though  quite  repug 
nant  to  the  navigation  laws,  were  supported  by  the  American 
courts  of  justice,  but  uniformly  disallowed  by  the  English  privy 
council,  which,  after  repeated  decisions  in  conformity  with  the 
principle,  that  the  ordinances  of  a  provincial  legislature  cannot 
derogate  from  the  general  jurisprudence  of  the  empire,  finally 
prohibited  all  farther  denizations  by  the  provincial  governors  or 
assemblies.1 

Far  from  being  mitigated  by  the  lapse  of  time,  the  discon 
tents  in  Virginia  were  exasperated  by  the  increasing  pressure 
of  the  commercial  restrictions,  corresponding  with  the  succes 
sive  exertions  of  the  English  government  to  promote  their 
more  effectual  operation.  Various  additional  causes  contrib 
uted  to  inflame  the  displeasure  of  the  colonists  ;  and  a  con 
siderable  native  population  having  now  grown  up  in  Virginia, 
the  resentment  of  these  persons  was  no  way  abated  by  the 
habitual  regard  and  fond  remembrance  which  emigrants  retain 
for  the  parent  state  which  is  also  the  land  of  their  individual 
nativity.  The  defectiveness  of  their  education  excluded  the 
influence  of  literature  from  acting  in  this  respect  as  a  substitute 
to  experience  ;  and  they  knew  little  of  England  beyond  the 
wrongs  which  they  heard  daily  imputed  to  her  injustice.  It 
was  natural  that  all  the  political  leaders  and  reasoners,  who 
either  sincerely  undertook  to  demonstrate  or  factiously  en 
deavoured  to  magnify  these  wrongs,  should  contrast  the  op 
pression  that  followed  restored  royalty  in  England  with  the  lib 
erality  which  the  colony  had  experienced  from  Oliver  Crom 
well  ;  and  the  effect  of  this  suggestion  was  to  associate  national 
prosperity  with  democratical  ideas  in  the  minds  of  a  numerous 
and  increasing  party  of  the  Virginian  planters.3 

The   Indian  hostilities,  after  infesting  the   frontiers,  began 

1  Chalmers. 

2  The  partial  and  contradictory  accounts  that  have  been  transmitted  of  the 
subsequent  events  bear  unhappy  testimony  to  the  influence  of  the  distinction 
that  now  began  to  prevail  in  Virginia  between  a  royalist  and  a  democratical 
party.     The  misrepresentations  of  faction  continue  to  hide  and  disguise  truth, 
after  its  passions  have  ceased  to  disturb  happiness. 


CHAP.  III.]        INDIAN  WAR.  —  INSURRECTIONS.  117 

now  to  penetrate  into  the  interior  of  the  province  ;  and  while 
the  colonists  were  reduced  to  defend  their  property  at  the 
hazard  of  their  lives,  they  found  it  additionally  endangered 
[1673]  by  the  large  and  improvident  grants  of  land  which  the 
king,  after  the  example  of  his  father,  yielded  with  lavish  pro 
fusion  and  facility  to  the  solicitations  of  his  favorites.  The 
fate  of  that  parent  had  warned  him  to  avoid,  in  general,  rather 
the  arrogance  that  provoked  than  the  injustice  that  deserved  it ; 
and  in  granting  those  applications,  without  fatiguing  himself  by 
any  inquiry  into  their  merits,  he  at  once  indulged  the  indolence 
of  his  disposition,  and  exerted  a  liberality  that  cost  him  noth 
ing  that  he  cared  for.  Many  of  the  royal  grants  not  only 
were  of  such  exorbitant  extent  as  to  be  unfavorable  to  the 
progress  of  cultivation,  but,  from  ignorance  or  inaccuracy  in  the 
definition  of  their  boundaries,  were  so  conceived  as  to  include 
tracts  of  land  that  had  already  been  planted  and  appropriated. 
Such  a  complication  of  exasperating  circumstances  brought 
the  discontents  of  the  colony  to  a  crisis. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1675,  two  slight  insurrections, 
which  were  rather  the  hasty  explosions  of  popular  irritation 
than  the  fruits  of  matured  design,  were  easily  suppressed  by  the 
governor,  but  gave  significant  intimation  of  the  state  and  the 
tendency  of  public  feeling  in  Virginia.  In  the  hope  of  averting 
the  crisis,  and  obtaining  redress  of  the  more  recent  grievances 
which  were  provoking  it,  the  assembly  despatched  deputies  to 
England,  who,  after  a  tedious  negotiation  with  the  king  and  his 
ministers,  had  brought  matters  to  the  point  of  a  happy  adjust 
ment,  and  obtained  the  promise  of  a  royal  charter,  defining 
both  the  constitution  and  the  territory  of  Virginia,  when  their 
expectations  were  frustrated  and  the  proceedings  suspended  by 
intelligence  of  a  formidable  rebellion  in  the  colony.  A  tax, 
imposed  by  the  assembly  to  defray  the  expense  of  the  deputa 
tion  [1676],  increased  the  discontent  which  the  deputation 
was  intended  to  remove  ;  and  when  the  dilatory  proceedings 
of  the  English  ministers,  who  disdained  to  allow  the  intelli 
gence  of  past  or  the  apprehensions  of  future  insurrection  to 
quicken  their  diligence,  seemed  to  confirm  the  assurances  of 
the  factious  leaders  of  the  colonists  that  even  their  last  sacrifice 
was  thrown  away,  the  tide  of  rage  and  disaffection  began  again 


118  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.1  [BOOK  I. 

to  swell  to  the  point  of  rebellion.  It  did  not  long  wait  for  ad 
ditional  provocation  to  excite,  or  an  able  leader  to  impel,  its 
fury.  For,  to  crown  the  provincial  distress,  the  Indian  war 
fare,  which  continued  to  prevail  notwithstanding  all  the  gover 
nor's  attempts  to  suppress  it,  now  spread  out  with  redoubled 
extent  and  fury,  and  threatened  a  formidable  addition  of  dan 
ger,  hardship,  and  expense. 

The  Indians  were  alarmed  and  irritated  by  a  series  of  en 
terprises  which  the  governor  promoted  for  exploring  the  large 
and  yet  unvisited  districts  adjoining  the  colonial  occupation, 
and  which  the  savages  regarded  as  a  preparatory  step  to  farther 
encroachments  on  their  domains.  Even  the  popularity  of  the 
long  tried  and  magnanimous  friend  of  Virginia,  Sir  William 
Berkeley,  was  overcast  by  the  blackness  of  this  cloud  of  ca 
lamities.  The  spirit  and  fidelity  with  which  he  had  adhered 
to  the  colony  through  every  variety  of  fortune,  his  earnest  re 
monstrances  with  the  English  government  against  the  commer 
cial  restraints,  his  generosity  in  devoting  a  considerable  part 
of  his  own  private  fortune  to  the  improvement  and  embellish 
ment  of  the  province,  and  the  disinterestedness  he  had  shown  in 
declining,  during  the  unprosperous  state  of  the  provincial 
finances,  to  accept  an  addition,  proposed  by  the  assembly,  to 
his  official  emoluments,  were  disregarded,  denied,  or  forgotten. 
[1676.]  To  his  age  and  incapacity  were  now  attributed  the 
burdens  of  the  people  and  the  distractions  of  the  time  ;  and 
he  was  loudly  accused  of  wanting  alike  honesty  to  resist  the 
tyrannical  policy  of  the  mother  country,  and  courage  to  repel 
the  hostility  of  the  savages.1  Such  ungrateful  injustice  is  rare 
ly,  if  ever,  committed  by  any  people  advanced  beyond  a  state 
of  national  barbarism,  except  when  the  insidious  suggestions  of 
factious  leaders  have  imposed  on  their  credulity  and  fanned 
their  passions  into  fury.  The  populace  of  Holland,  wrhen,  a 
few  years  before  this  period,  they  tore  in  pieces  their  benefac 
tor,  John  De  Witt,  were  not  only  terrified  by  the  progress  of 
their  national  calamities,  but  deluded  by  the  profligate  artifices 
of  the  retainers  of  the  House  of  Orange.  To  similar  influence 
(exerted  in  similar  circumstances)  were  the  enraged  and  mis- 

1  Beverley.     Chalmers.     Oldmixon    (2d  edit.).     Campbell.     Burk. 


CHAP.  III.]  BACON'S  REBELLION.  119 

guided  Virginians  now  exposed  from  the  artifice   and  ambition 
of  Nathaniel  Bacon. 

This  man  was  educated  to  the  profession  of  a  lawyer  in 
England  ;  and  only  three  years  had  elapsed,  since,  for  some 
unexplained  reason,  he  emigrated  to  Virginia.  Short  as  this 
interval  was,  it  sufficed  to  advance  him  to  a  conspicuous  sta 
tion  in  the  colony,  and  to  illustrate  the  disposition  and  talents 
of  a  popular  leader.  The  consideration  he  derived  from  his 
legal  attainments,  and  the  esteem  he  acquired  by  an  insinuating 
address,  had  procured  him  already  a  seat  in  the  council,  and 
the  rank  of  colonel  in  the  provincial  militia.  But  his  temper 
was  not  accommodated  to  subordinate  office  ;  and,  unfortunate 
ly,  the  distractions  of  the  colony  presented  to  him  a  sphere  of 
action  more  congenial  to  his  character  and  capacity.  Young, 
sanguine,  eloquent,  and  daring,  yet  artful  and  ambitious,  he 
presented  himself  in  the  assemblies  of  the  discontented  planters, 
and,  by  his  spirited  harangues  on  the  grievances  under  which 
they  labored,  he  promoted  their  exasperation  and  attracted 
their  favor.  He  was  implicated  in  the  abortive  insurrection  of 
the  preceding  year,  and  had  been  imprisoned  and  subsequently 
pardoned  by  the  governor  ;  but  less  affected  by  the  clemency 
than  encouraged  by  the  impunity  which  he  experienced,  and 
sensible  that  the  avenue  to  legitimate  promotion  was  now  for 
ever  closed  against  him,  he  determined  to  unite  his  lot  with  the 
fortune  of  the  malcontent  party  ;  and  taking  advantage  of  their 
present  excitation,  he  once  again  came  forward,  and  addressed 
them  with  artifice  which  their  uncultivated  understandings  were 
unable  to  detect,  and  with  eloquence  which  their  untamed  pas 
sions  rendered  quite  irresistible.  Finding  that  the  sentiments 
most  prevalent  with  his  auditory  were  the  alarm  and  indigna 
tion  excited  by  the  Indian  ravages,  he  hastened  to  strike  in 
with  the  impressions  of  which  he  proposed  to  lay  hold,  and 
loudly  charged  the  governor  with  neglect  or  incapacity  to  exert 
the  vigor  that  was  requisite  for  the  general  safety  ;  and  having 
expatiated  on  the  facility  with  which  the  whole  Indian  race 
might  be  exterminated,  he  exhorted  his  fellow-colonists  to  take 
arms  in  their  own  defence,  and  achieve  the  deliverance  they 
must  no  longer  expect  from  any  other  quarter.  So  acceptable 
was  this  address  and  the  speaker  to  the  temper  of  the  popular 


120  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

mind,  that  his  exhortation  was  instantly  obeyed,  and  his  main 
object  no  less  successfully  accomplished. 

A  great  multitude  hastened  to  embody  themselves  for  an 
expedition  against  the  Indians  ;  and  electing  Bacon  to  be  their 
general,  committed  themselves  to  his  direction.  He  assured 
them,  in  return,  that  he  would  never  lay  down  his  arms,  till  he 
had  avenged  their  sufferings  and  redressed  their  wrongs.  To 
give  some  color  of  legitimacy  to  the  preeminence  he  had  ob 
tained,  and,  perhaps,  expecting  to  precipitate  matters  to  the 
extremity  which  his  interest  required  that  they  should  speedily 
reach,  he  applied  to  the  governor  for  an  official  confirmation 
of  the  popular  election,  and  offered  to  march  immediately 
against  the  common  enemy.  Berkeley,  suspecting  his  real  de 
signs,  thought  it  prudent  to  temporize,  and  try  the  effect  of 
negotiation  ;  but  he  had  to  deal  with  a  much  more  practised 
adept  in  dissimulation  than  himself ;  and  encountered  in  Bacon 
a  man  precautioned  by  his  own  guile  and  insincerity  against 
the  craft  of  others,  and  fully  conscious  that  promptitude  and 
resolute  perseverance  alone  could  extricate  him  with  safety  or 
credit  from  the  dangers  of  his  situation.  Pressed  for  an  an 
swer,  and  finding  that  the  applicants  were  not  to  be  soothed 
by  his  conciliating  demeanour,  Berkeley  issued  a  proclamation, 
commanding  the  multitude  to  disperse  under  pain  of  incurring 
the  guilt  of  rebellion. 

Bacon,  no  more  disconcerted  by  this  assumption  of  vigor 
than  he  had  been  duped  by  the  previous  negotiation,  instantly 
marched  to  Jamestown  at  the  head  of  six  hundred  of  his  fol 
lowers,  and,  surrounding  the  house  where  the  governor  and 
assembly  were  engaged  in  deliberation,  he  demanded  the  com 
mission  which  his  proceedings  and  retinue  showed  how  little 
he  either  needed  or  regarded.  Berkeley,  undismayed  by  the 
dangers  that  environed  him,  was  sensible  of  his  inability  to 
repel  the  force  of  the  insurgents,  and  yet  disdained  to  bend 
his  authority  before  their  menacing  attitude,  or  yield  to  their 
imperious  demands.  Confronting,  with  invincible  courage,  the 
men  who  reproached  him  with  defect  of  this  virtue,  he  pe 
remptorily  commanded  them  to  depart ;  and  when  they  re 
fused,  he  presented  his  breast  to  their  weapons,  and  calmly 
defied  their  rage.  But  the  council,  more  considerate  of  their 


CHAP.  III.]  BACON'S  REBELLION. 

own  safety,  and  fearful  of  driving  the  multitude  to  some  fatal 
act  of  fury,  hastily  prepared  a  commission,  by  which  Bacon 
was  appointed  captain-general  of  all  the  forces  of  Virginia, 
and,  by  dint  of  earnest  entreaty,  prevailed  with  the  governor 
to  unite  with  them  in  subscribing  it.  The  insurgents,  thus  far 
successful,  retired  in  triumph  ;  and  the  council  no  sooner  felt 
themselves  delivered  from  the  immediate  presence  of  danger, 
than,  passing  from  the  depth  of  timidity  to  the  height  of  pre 
sumption,  they  enacted  and  published  an  ordinance  annulling 
the  commission  they  had  granted,  as  having  been  extorted  by 
force,  proclaiming  Bacon  a  rebel,  commanding  his  followers  to 
deliver  him  up,  and  summoning  the  militia  to  arm  in  defence 
of  the  constitution.  They  found  too  little  difficulty  in  per 
suading  the  governor  to  confirm,  by  his  sanction,  this  indiscreet 
affectation  of  an  authority  which  they  were  totally  incapable 
of  supporting.  The  consequences  might  have  been  easily  fore 
seen.  Bacon  and  his  associates,  flushed  with  their  recent  tri 
umph,  and  incensed  at  the  impotent  menace,  which  they  de 
nounced  as  a  base  and  treacherous  breach  of  compact,  re 
turned  directly  to  Jamestown  ;  and  the  governor,  destitute  of 
any  force  sufficient  to  cope  with  the  insurgents,  retired  across 
the  bay  to  Accomac  on  the  eastern  shore.  Some  of  the 
counsellors  accompanied  him  thither  ;  the  rest  retired  to  their 
estates  ;  the  frame  of  the  provincial  administration  seemed  to 
be  dissolved,  and  Bacon  took  unresisted  possession  of  the  va 
cant  government. 

The  preeminence  which  he  attained  by  this  vigorous  con 
duct  Bacon  employed  with  much  address  to  add  strength  and 
reputation  to  his  party.  To  invest  his  usurped  jurisdiction 
with  the  semblance  of  a  legal  establishment,  he  summoned  a 
convention  of  the  principal  planters  of  the  province,  and  pre 
vailed  with  a  numerous  body  of  them  to  pledge  themselves  by 
oath  to  support  his  authority  and  resist  his  enemies.  A  decla 
ration  or  manifesto  was  published,  in  the  name  of  this  body, 
setting  forth  that  Sir  William  Berkeley  had  wickedly  fomented 
a  civil  war  among  the  people,  and  that,  after  thus  violating  his 
trust,  he  had  abdicated  the  government,  to  the  surprise  and 
confusion  of  the  country  ;  that  General  Bacon  had  raised  an 
army  for  the  public  service  and  with  the  public  approbation  ; 

VOL.  i.  16 


122  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

that  the  late  governor  having,  as  was  reported,  abused  the  ear 
of  the  king  by  falsely  representing  that  the  general  and  his 
followers  were  rebels,  and  pressing  his  Majesty  to  send  forces 
to  subdue  them,  the  welfare  of  the  colony  and  their  true  alle 
giance  to  his  most  sacred  Majesty  alike  required  that  they 
should  oppose  and  suppress  all  forces  whatsoever,  except  those 
commanded  by  the  general,  till  the  king  should  be  fully  in 
formed  of  the  real  merits  and  nature  of  the  case  by  persons 
despatched  to  him  by  Bacon,  to  whom,  in  the  interim,  all  the 
inhabitants  were  required  to  take  an  oath  of  allegiance.  It 
was  remarked  by  the  wise,  that  this  manifesto,  which  might 
have  been  expected  to  display  the  genuine  source  of  the  re 
volt,  mentioned  none  of  the  original  causes  of  quarrel  ;  and 
hence  they  justly  suspected  that  the  leader  of  the  insurgents 
entertained  personal  and  ambitious  designs,  to  which  he  pur 
posed  to  render  the  discontents  of  his  followers  subservient, 
which  extended  beyond  the  immediate  measures  in  relation  to 
the  Indians,  and  which  had  already  suggested  to  him  a  specious 
pretence  for  exposing  the  colony  to  a  war  with  the  forces  of 
the  mother  country.  Yet  such  was  the  spirit  of  the  times, 
and  so  prompt  the  sympathy  with  resistance  to  every  branch 
of  an  administration  which  Charles  was  daily  rendering  more 
odious  and  suspected,  that,  when  the  rebel  manifesto  was  pro 
mulgated  in  England,  it  found  admirers  among  the  people,  and 
even  within  the  walls  of  that  parliament  whose  injustice  formed 
the  only  real  grievance  that  Virginia  had  at  present  to  com 
plain  of.  Though  Bacon  designedly  omitted  to  remind  his 
adherents  that  the  conduct  of  the  Indian  war  was  the  object 
for  which  they  had  originally  intrusted  him  with  military  com 
mand,  it  was  to  this  object  that  his  first  exertions  were  actually 
directed.  To  redeem  his  promise  and  to  exercise  his  troops, 
he  marched  at  the  head  of  an  expedition  against  the  hostile 
savages,  who,  rashly  awaiting  a  general  engagement,  were  de 
feated  with  a  loss  which  they  never  were  able  to  repair. 

Berkeley,  meanwhile,  having  collected  a  force  from  levies 
among  the  planters  who  remained  well  affected  to  him,  and 
from  the  crews  of  the  English  shipping  on  the  coasts,  pre 
pared  to  give  battle  to  the  army  of  the  usurper  ;  and  several 
sharp  encounters  ensued  between  the  parties  with  various  sue- 


CHAP.   III.]  DEATH   OF   BACON.  123 

cess.  All  the  horrors  of  civil  war  descended  on  the  colony. 
Jamestown,  which  already  contained  several  elegant  buildings, 
erected  at  considerable  expense  by  the  governor  and  the  more 
opulent  planters,  was  reduced  to  ashes  by  the  insurgents,  at 
the  command  of  Bacon,  who  judged  it  a  station  which  he 
could  not  safely  retain  ;  the  estates  of  the  loyalists  were  pil 
laged,  their  friends  and  relatives  seized  as  hostages,  and  the 
richest  plantations  in  the  province  laid  waste.  The  governor 
was  prompted  by  his  indignation,  as  well  as  by  the  rage  of  his 
partisans,  to  retaliate  these  extremities,  and  even  to  execute 
some  of  the  insurgents  by  martial  law  ;  and  the  animosity  of 
both  parties  was  rapidly  mounting  to  a  pitch  that  threatened  a 
war  of  mutual  extermination.  The  superiority  of  the  insurgent 
force  had  hitherto  confined  the  efforts  of  the  loyalists  in  the 
field  to  mere  skirmishing  engagements  ;  but  the  tidings  of  an 
approaching  armament,  which  the  king  despatched  from  Eng 
land  under  Sir  John  Berry  to  the  assistance  of  the  governor, 
gave  promise  of  a  wider  range  of  carnage  and  desolation. 
Charles  had  issued  a  proclamation  [Oct.  1676],  declaring  Ba 
con  a  traitor  and  the  sole  promoter  of  the  insurrection  ;  ten 
dering  pardon  to  all  his  followers  who  should  forsake  him, 
and  freedom  to  all  slaves  who  would  assist  in  suppressing  the 
revolt.  However  elated  the  loyalists  might  be  with  the  intel 
ligence  of  the  approaching  succour,  the  leader  of  the  insurgents 
was  no  way  dismayed  by  it ;  and  his  influence  over  his  fol 
lowers  was  unbounded.  Conscious  now  that  his  power  and  his 
life  were  indissolubly  connected,  he  determined  to  encounter 
whatever  force  might  be  sent  against  him.  He  was  aware,  at 
the  same  time,  of  the  importance  of  striking  a  decisive  blow 
while  the  advantage  of  numbers  remained  with  him  ;  and  with 
this  view,  having  enlarged  his  resources  by  proclaiming  a  gen 
eral  forfeiture  of  the  property  of  all  who  either  opposed  his 
pretensions  or  even  affected  neutrality,  he  was  preparing  to 
take  the  field,  when  his  career  was  arrested  by  that  Power 
which  can  wither  in  an  instant  the  sinews  of  abused  strength, 
and  arrest  the  uplifted  arm  of  the  most  formidable  destroyer. 
Happily  for  his  country,  and  to  the  manifest  advantage  not  less 
of  his  followers  than  his  adversaries,  Bacon  unexpectedly  sick 
ened  and  died.  [Jan.  1677]. 


124  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

The  ascendency  with  which  this  remarkable  person  had  pre 
dominated,  as  the  master-spirit  of  his  party,  was  illustrated  by 
the  effect  of  his  death  on  their  sentiments  and  conduct.  The 
bands  of  their  confederacy  seemed  to  be  cut  asunder  by  the 
loss  of  their  general,  nor  did  any  successor  even  attempt  to  re 
unite  them  ;  and  their  sanguine  hopes  and  resolute  adherence 
to  Bacon  were  succeeded  by  mutual  distrust  and  universal 
despondency.  Ingram,  who  had  been  lieutenant-general,  and 
Walklate,  who  had  been  major-general  of  the  insurgent  forces, 
showed  some  disposition  to  prolong  the  struggle  by  maintain 
ing  possession  of  a  stronghold  which  was  occupied  by  their 
party  ;  but  after  a  short  treaty  with  Sir  William  Berkeley,  they 
consented  to  surrender  it,  on  condition  of  receiving  a  pardon 
for  their  offences.  The  other  detachments  of  the  rebel  army, 
finding  themselves  broken  and  disunited,  afraid  to  protract  a 
desperate  enterprise,  and  hoping,  perhaps,  to  be  included  in  the 
indemnity  granted  to  Walklate  and  Ingram,  or  at  least  to  ex 
perience  equal  lenity,  laid  down  their  arms  [1677],  and  sub 
mitted  to  the  governor. 

Thus  suddenly  and  providentially  was  dissipated  a  tempest 
that  seemed  to  portend  the  entire  ruin  of  Virginia.  From  the 
man  whose  evil  genius  excited  and  directed  its  fury,  this  in 
surrection  has  been  distinguished  by  the  name  of  Bacon's  Re 
bellion.  It  placed  the  colony  for  seven  months  in  the  power 
of  that  daring  adventurer,  involved  the  inhabitants  during  all 
that  period  in  bloodshed  and  confusion,  and  was  productive  of 
a  devastation  of  property  to  the  extent  of  at  least  a  hundred 
thousand  pounds.1  To  the  mother  country  it  conveyed  a  les 
son  which  she  appears  never  to  have  understood,  till  the  loss  of 
her  colonies  illustrated  its  meaning,  and  the  consequence  of 
disregarding  it.  For,  after  every  allowance  for  the  ability  and 
artifice  of  Bacon,  it  was  manifest  that  the  general  discontent 
and  irritation,  occasioned  by  the  commercial  restrictions,  had 
formed  the  groundwork  of  his  influence  ;  and  it  required  little 

1  Beverley.  Oldmixon.  Modern  Universal  History,  XLI.  Sir  William 
Keith's  History  of  Virginia.  Chalmers.  Burk.  Campbell.  Mrs.  Aphra  Behn 
celebrated  this  rebellion  in  a  tragi-comedy,  entitled  The  Widow  Ranter,  or  the 
History  of  Bacon  in  Virginia,  to  which  Dryden  wrote  a  prologue.  The  play 
was  acted  unsuccessfully,  and  afterwards  published  in  1690.  There  is  a  copy 
of  it  in  the  British  Museum.  It  sets  historical  truth  entirely  and  avowedly  at 
defiance,  and  is  replete  with  coarse  humor  and  indelicate  wit. 


CHAP.  III.]     RIGOROUS  PUNISHMENT  OF  THE  REBELS.      125 

sagacity  to  foresee  that  those  sentiments  would  be  rendered 
more  inveterate  and  more  formidable  by  the  growth  of  the 
province,  and  by  the  increased  connection  and  sympathy  with 
the  other  colonial  settlements,  which  the  lapse  of  time  and  the 
habitual  consciousness  of  common  interests  and  grievances 
would  infallibly  promote.  Had  Bacon  been  a  more  honest  and 
disinterested  leader,  this  lesson  would  perhaps  have  been  more 
distinctly  unfolded,  and  the  rebellion,  it  is  probable,  would  not 
have  ended  with  his  life.  But,  instead  of  sincerely  embracing 
the  cause  of  his  associates,  he  contrived  to  render  their  pas 
sions  instrumental  to  the  gratification  of  his  own  sinister  ambi 
tion.  The  assertors  of  the  interests  of  Virginia  were  thus 
converted  into  the  partisans  of  an  individual  ;  and  when  his 
presence  and  influence  were  withdrawn,  they  perceived  at  once 
that  they  were  embarked  in  a  contest  which  to  themselves  had 
neither  interest  nor  object. 

No  sooner  were  the  insurgents  disbanded,  and  the  legitimate 
government  restored,  than  Sir  William  Berkeley  developed 
the  vindictive  powers  of  the  law  with  a  rigor  more  propor 
tioned  to  the  guilt  of  the  rebels  and  the  provocation  he  had 
received  from  them,  than  akin  to  the  general  humanity  of  his 
character  and  the  lenity  which  he  had  extended  to  the  pro 
moters  of  former  insurrections.  But  the  recent  rebellion  had 
produced  a  scene  of  outrage  and  bloodshed  to  which  nothing 
similar  had  occurred  in  the  preceding  commotions,  and  which 
he  probably  regarded  as  the  reproach  and  requital  of  his  lenity 
on  those  occasions.  Refusing  to  publish  the  royal  proclamation 
which  he  now  received  from  England,  offering  pardon  to  all 
who  would  lay  down  their  arms,  he  caused  several  of  the  rebels 
who  were  not  included  in  his  treaty  with  Walklate  and  Ingram 
to  be  brought  to  trial  for  treason.  All  who  confessed  their 
guilt  and  implored  mercy  seem  to  have  been  exempted  from 
the  extremity  of  legal  rigor  ;  but  of  others  who  abided  the 
issue  of  a  trial,  ten  were  convicted  and  executed.  The  num 
ber  of  the  guilty,  which  at  first  had  seemed  to  betoken  their 
security,  served  now  to  aggravate  and  diffuse  the  terror  of 
these  proceedings,  which  were  at  last  interrupted  by  an  ad 
dress  from  the  provincial  assembly,  beseeching  the  governor  to 
forbear  from  the  farther  infliction  of  capital  punishment.  By 


126  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

this  assembly  a  few  of  the  surviving  ringleaders  of  the  insur 
rection  were  subjected  to  fines  and  disabilities,  and  Bacon, 
together  with  certain  of  his  officers  who  had  perished  in  the 
contest,  was  attainted. 

An  attainder  of  the  dead  seems  an  arrogant  attempt  of  hu 
man  power  to  extend  its  arm  beyond  the  scene  of  human  life, 
to  invade  with  its  vengeance  the  inviolable  sanctuary  of  the 
grave,  and  to  reclaim  to  the  jurisdiction  of  transient  authority 
and  fallible  judgment  the  defenceless  being  and  supposed  of 
fender,  who  has  already  been  removed  by  the  act  of  divine 
power  to  abide  the  decree  of  eternal  and  unerring  justice.  In 
England  the  measure  was  regarded  as  an  act  of  sovereignty 
beyond  the  competence  of  a  subordinate  legislature,  and  held 
to  be  void  from  defect  of  power  ;  but  this  objection  was  ob 
viated,  and  the  attainder  subsequently  reenacted,  by  a  bill  to 
the  same  effect,  which  was  framed  in  England,  and  transmitted 
under  the  great  seal  to  the  colonial  assembly.1 

The  tardy  aid  despatched  from  England  to  the  defence  of 
the  provincial  government  did  not  reach  Virginia  till  after  the 
rebellion  was  suppressed.  With  the  fleet  arrived  Colonel 
Jeffreys  [April,  1677],  appointed  by  the  king  to  signify  the 
recall  and  succeed  to  the  office  of  Sir  William  Berkeley,  who 
now  closed  in  peace  an  administration  of  nearly  forty  years  ; 
and  shortly  after,  closing  his  life,  may  be  said  to  have  died  in 
the  service  of  Virginia.  This  gallant  and  honorable  man  was 
thus  spared  the  mortification  of  beholding  the  injustice  and  irn- 

1  Abridgment  of  the  Laws  of  Virginia.  Oldmixon.  Keith.  Chalmers. 
Burk.  Campbell.  The  account  which  I  have  given  of  the  penal  proceedings 
which  followed  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion  is  derived  from  a  strict  ex 
amination  and  comparison  of  the  statements  of  these  and  other  writers,  and 
coincides  entirely  with  none  of  them.  Except  Burk  and  Campbell  (who 
merely  repeats,  without  vouching  for,  the  statements  of  Burk),  every  other 
writer  has  declared  that  Sir  William  Berkeley  punished  none  of  the  rebels 
capitally,  and  ascribed  this  forbearance  to  his  having  procured  their  surrender 
by  a  promise  of  general  pardon.  Burk  expressly  asserts  that  Berkeley  gave 
such  assurance  to  the  rebels,  and  charges  him  with  having  violated  it  both  by 
the  executions  which  I  have  related  and  by  others  inflicted  by  the  more  sum 
mary  process  of  martial  law.  But  an  attentive  examination  of  the  documents 
to  which  he  refers  has  satisfied  me  that  there  is  no  credible  evidence  of  any 
person  having  been  put  to  death  by  martial  law,  except  during  the  subsistence 
of  the  rebellion,  or  of  any  promise  of  pardon  having  been  made  to  those  who 
were  tried  and  convicted  after  its  suppression.  Neither  the  colonial  assembly, 
in  their  address  against  further  capital  punishments,  nor  the  royal  commis 
sioners,  in  their  subsequent  charges  against  the  governor,  have  given  any 
countenance  to  the  suppositions  adopted  by  Burk. 


CHAP.  III.]     DEATH  OF  BERKELEY.  — HIS  CHARACTER.     127 

policy  with  which  the  royal  authority  was  soon  after  employed 
to  blacken  his  fame,  and  to  weaken  all  those  sentiments  of 
loyalty  in  the  colony,  which  it  had  been  the  great  object  of  his 
wishes  to  cultivate  and  cherish.  Entertaining  all  the  principles 
of  an  old  cavalier,  endowed  with  a  character  well  formed  to 
recommend  his  principles,  and  presiding  in  a  colony  where  the 
prevailing  sentiments  of  the  people  were  for  a  long  time  entirely 
congenial  with  his  own,  he  had  hoped  to  render  Virginia  a 
scene  where  the  loyalty  that  was  languishing  in  Europe  might 
be  renovated  by  transmigration  into  a  young  and  growing  body 
politic,  and  expand  to  a  new  and  more  vigorous  maturity. 
But  this  was  not  the  destination  of  the  provinces  of  America. 
The  naked  republican  principle,  that  substitutes  the  respect  and 
approbation  of  citizens  toward  their  magistrate,  in  place  of  the 
reverence  and  attachment  of  subjects  to  their  sovereign,  was 
held  by  all  the  cavaliers  in  utter  abhorrence  ;  and  a  more 
favorable  specimen  of  the  opposite  principle  which  they  em 
braced,  and  of  that  mixed  system  of  opinion  and  sentiment 
which  it  tended  to  produce,  will  not  easily  be  found  than  in 
the  character  and  conduct  of  Sir  William  Berkeley.  The 
courageous  regard  he  demonstrated  for  his  people  not  only 
excited  their  grateful  admiration,  -but  recommended  to  their 
esteem  the  generous  devotion  to  his  king  with  which  it  was  in 
his  language  and  demeanour  inseparably  blended.  When  the 
hopes  of  the  royalists  were  extinguished  in  every  other  quarter 
of  the  empire,  this  governor  of  an  infant  province  boldly  ar 
rayed  his  scanty  forces  on  the  banks  of  James  River,  in  de 
fence  of  his  people  and  his  principles,  against  the  victorious 
arms  of  the  most  formidable  power  in  Europe  ;  and  afterwards, 
emerging  from  retirement,  and  seconding  the  popular  impulse, 
he  again  braved  the  same  unequal  contest,  and,  disowning  the 
authority,  defied  the  forces,  of  the  protectoral  government. 
For  many  years,  his  influence  in  Virginia  was  unbounded,  and 
his  virtues  expanded  with  the  growth  and  the  enjoyment  of  his 
popularity.  But  in  the  close  of  his  administration,  —  when  he 
saw  the  efficacy  of  these  virtues  impaired,  his  long  labors  de 
feated,  and  the  scene  of  all  his  loyal  and  disinterested  service 
gradually  pervaded  by  discontent  and  democratical  sentiment, 
and  finally  defaced  and  convulsed  by  rebellion,  —  his  dispo- 


128  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

sition  seemed  to  derive  a  tincture  from  the  bitterness  of  disap 
pointment,  and  his  conduct,  both  during  the  continuance  and 
after  the  suppression  of  Bacon's  rebellion,  has  been  reproached 
with  splenetic  impatience  and  vindictive  severity.  In  happier 
times,  he  approved  himself  a  wise  legislator,  as  well  as  a 
benevolent  and  upright  magistrate  ;  and  we  are  informed  by 
the  editor  of  the  Laws  of  Virginia,  that  the  most  judicious 
and  most  popular  of  them  were  suggested  by  Sir  William 
Berkeley.  When  his  death  was  known,  and  he  was  no  longer 
an  object  of  flattery  or  of  fear,  the  provincial  assembly  re 
corded  the  sentiments  which  the  colony  entertained  of  his  con 
duct  in  the  grateful  declaration,  "  that  he  had  been  an  excellent 
and  well  deserving  governor  "  ;  and  earnestly  recommended 
his  widow  to  the  justice  and  generosity  of  the  king.1  The 
bosom  of  the  king,  however,  was  little  accessible  to  such  senti 
ments  ;  and  his  reign  was  calculated  to  dispel,  instead  of  con 
firming,  the  impressions  of  cavalier  loyalty. 

The  most  remarkable  event  that  distinguished  the  govern 
ment  of  Colonel  Jeffreys  was  the  conclusion  of  the  Indian 
war,  which  had  raged  so  long,  and  contributed,  with  other 
causes,  to  the  production  of  the  late  rebellion,  by  a  treaty 
which  gave  universal  satisfaction.  This,  too,  was  the  only 
act  of  his  administration  that  was  attended  with  consequen 
ces  so  agreeable.  Jeffreys,  Sir  John  Berry,  and  Colonel 
Moryson  were  appointed  commissioners  to  investigate  and 
report  the  causes  of  Bacon's  rebellion.  They  commenced 
their  inquiries  with  an  avowed  prepossession  in  favor  of  the 
insurgents,  and  conducted  them  with  the  most  indecent  par 
tiality.  The  temptation  which  their  office  presented  to  magnify 
the  importance  of  their  labors  by  new  and  unexpected  dis 
coveries,  and  to  prove,  by  arraignment  of  the  late  administra 
tion,  that  they  had  not  been  appointed  its  censors  in  vain,  con 
tributed,  no  doubt,  to  inspire  the  malevolence  and  injustice 
which  they  displayed  in  a  degree  that  would  otherwise  seem 
quite  unaccountable.  Instead  of  indemnifying,  or  even  ap 
plauding,  they  discountenanced  the  loyalists  who  had  rallied 
in  the  time  of  danger  around  the  provincial  government  ;  and 

1  Chalmers.    Preface  to  Moryson's  edition  of  the  Laics  of  Virginia.    Life  of 
Sir  William  Berkeley. 


CHAP.  III.]     COMMISSIONERS  CRIMINATE   BERKELEY.        129 

having  invited  all  persons  who  were  engaged  in  the  insurrection 
to  come  forward  and  state  their  grievances  without  fear,  and 
unequivocally  demonstrated  the  favorable  acceptance  which 
such  representations  might  expect,  they  succeeded  in  collect 
ing  a  mass  of  confused  and  passionate  complaints,  which  they 
digested  into  a  report  fraught  with  crimination  of  Sir  William 
Berkeley  and  his  council,  and  with  insinuations  against  the 
honesty  and  the  courage  of  all  the  planters  who  had  united 
with  the  governor  in  withstanding  the  rebels.1  While  their 
folly  or  malignity  thus  tended  to  rekindle  the  dissensions  of  the 
colonists,  their  intemperance  involved  them  in  a  dispute  that 
united  all  parties  against  themselves.  Finding  that  the  assem 
bly  hesitated  to  comply  with  a  requisition  they  addressed  to  it, 
that  all  its  books  and  journals  should  be  submitted  to  their 
inspection,  they  seized  these  records  by  force,  and  withdrew 
them  from  the  clerk  who  was  intrusted  with  their  custody. 
Incensed  at  this  insult,  the  assembly  demanded  satisfaction 
from  Jeffreys  ;  and  when  he  appealed  to  the  authority  of  the 
great  seal  of  England,  under  which  the  commissioners  acted, 
they  replied  to  him,  in  language  worthy  of  the  descendants  of 
Englishmen  and  the  parents  of  Americans,  "  that  such  a  breach 
of  privilege  could  not  be  commanded  under  the  great  seal,  be 
cause  they  could  not  find  that  any  king  of  England  had  ever 
done  so  in  former  times."  The  spirit  thus  displayed  by  the 
assembly  appears  the  more  deserving  of  applause,  when  we 
consider  that  a  body  of  regular  troops,  the  first  ever  sent  to 
Virginia,  were  now  stationed  in  the  colony,  under  the  command 

1  The  memory  of  Sir  William  Berkeley  was  defended  against  the  misrepre 
sentations  of  the  commissioners  by  his  brother,  Lord  Berkeley,  (Chalmers,) 
and  his  fame  suffered  no  diminution  from  their  report.  Burk,  who  has  evi 
dently  conceived  a  strong  prejudice  against  Berkeley,  expresses  a  different 
opinion.  He  asserts,  that  Berkeley,  on  his  return  to  England,  found  that  his 
conduct  was  disapproved  by  the  king.  But  Oldmixon,  whose  authority  on  a 
point  like  this  is  entitled  to  the  highest  respect,  declares  that  Berkeley  before 
his  death  received  an  assurance  of  the  esteem  and  approbation  of  his  sovereign. 

During  the  disputes  that  preceded  the  war  of  independence,  it  was  common 
for  the  writers  wno  espoused  the  cause  of  America  to  aggravate  the  blame  of 
the  British  government  by  exaggerating  the  previous  loyalty  of  the  Ameri 
cans.  But  this  representation  has  ceased  to  please  in  America ;  and  some  of 
her  late  writers  have  preferably  devoted  their  labor  and  ingenuity  to  the  illus 
tration  of  the  antiquity  of  her  republican  spirit.  Burk,  in  particular,  has  mag 
nified  beyond  their  due  importance  the  first  manifestations  of  discontent  and 
democratical  feeling  in  Virginia;  and,  for  the  credit  both  of  his  representations 
and  of  his  countrymen,  has  eagerly  adopted  every  factious  charge  and  inju 
rious  supposition  with  respect  to  Sir  William  Berkeley. 

VOL.    I.  17 


130  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

of  Sir  John  Berry.  Informed  of  this  proceeding,  the  king,  in 
strains  that  rival  the  -  arrogance  of  his  father  and  grandfather, 
commanded  the  governor  "  to  signify  his  Majesty's  indignation 
at  language  so  seditious,  and  to  give  the  leaders  marks  of  the 
royal  displeasure."  Berry  and  Moryson  soon  after  returned 
to  England,  leaving  the  colony  in  a  state  of  ferment,  and  all 
parties  disgusted  and  disappointed. 

To  the  other  causes  of  discontent  was  added  the  burden  of 
supporting  the  soldiery,  who,  receiving  no  remittances  of  pay 
from  England,  indemnified  themselves  by  their  exactions  from 
the  planters.  The  impatience  created  by  this  treatment,  how 
ever,  was  mitigated  by  the  mild  and  prudent  conduct  of  an 
aged  officer  and  venerable  man,  Sir  Henry  Chicheley,  to 
whom,  as  lieutenant-governor,  the  administration  devolved,  on 
the  death  of  Jeffreys  [1678]  ;  and  as,  during  his  presidency, 
some  of  the  large  and  improvident  donations  of  land  by  the 
crown,  that  had  been  so  much  complained  of,  were  revoked, 
and  certain  other  grievances  corrected,  a  short  gleam  of  pros 
perity  was  shed  on  the  colony,  and  an  interval  of  comparative 
repose  gave  the  people  time  to  breathe,  before  the  resumption 
of  tyranny  with  a  violence  which  was  to  endure  till  the  British 
Revolution.1 

It  was  not  to  royal  generosity  or  benevolence  that  the  colo 
nists  were  indebted  for  the  lenient  administration  of  Sir  Henry 
Chicheley.  Charles  had  some  time  before  conferred  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  province  on  Lord  Culpepper,  who,  though  very 
willing  to  accept  this  important  office,  showed  so  little  readi 
ness  to  perform  the  duties  of  it,  that  it  was  not  till  he  had  been 
reprimanded  by  the  king  for  his  neglect  that  he  made  his 
voyage  to  Virginia.  [May,  1680.]  His  administration  was  con 
ducted  with  the  same  arbitrary  spirit  that  the  royal  govern 
ment  had  now  begun  to  indulge  without  control  in  the  mother 
country.  Having  wrested  from  the  assembly  the  nomination 
of  its  own  most  confidential  officer,  the  secretary  who  com 
posed  its  journals  ;  having  abolished  the  power  it  had  hitherto 
exercised  of  entertaining  appeals  from  the  decisions  of  the  pro 
vincial  judicatories  ;  having  accumulated  a  considerable  sum  of 

1  Chalmers. 


CHAP.  III.]     LORD  CULPEPPER'S  ADMINISTRATION.  131 

money  by  official  pillage  ;  and  having  guarded  his  tyranny  from 
complaint  by  a  proclamation,  that  interdicted,  under  the  se 
verest  penalties,  all  disrespectful  speeches  against  the  governor 
or  his  administration,  —  he  returned  [Aug.  1680],  after  a  very 
short  stay  in  Virginia,  to  dissipate  the  spoils  of  the  province 
in  the  luxury  of  England.  Yet  on  this  ignoble  lord  did  the 
king  confer  the  commission  of  governor  for  life,  and  a  salary 
twice  as  large  as  the  emoluments  of  Sir  William  Berkeley. 

The  irritation  created  by  these  proceedings  sharpened  the 
sense  of  the  hardships  which  the  colonists  were  now  enduring 
from  the  depressed  price  of  tobacco  ;  and  the  public  impatience 
exploded  in  a  tumultuary  attempt  to  destroy  all  the  new  to 
bacco  plantations  that  threatened  to  increase  the  depression  of 
price    by  multiplying  still  farther   the  quantities   of  produce. 
[May,  1682.]    The  insurrection  might  have  proceeded  to  very 
serious  extremities,  if  the  prudence  and  activity  of  Sir  Henry 
Chicheley  had  not  again  been  exerted   to  compose  the  public 
discontent  and  restore  the  peace  of  the  colony.      To  any  mind 
influenced  by  liberal  justice,  or  susceptible  of  humane  impres 
sions,  this  slight  and  short-lived  insurrection  was  strongly  rec 
ommended  to  indulgent  consideration.     It  was  but  a  momentary 
expression  of  popular  impatience  created  by  extreme  suffering  ; 
and  the  earnest,  though  ineffectual,  addresses  by  which  the 
assembly  had   recently  solicited  from  the  king  a  prohibition  of 
the  increase  of  tobacco  plantations  both  suggested  and  seemed 
to  sanction  the  object  to  which  the  violence  of  the  rioters  was 
directed.     But  to  the   king  it  appeared  in  the  light  of  an  out 
rage  to  his  dignity,  which  imperiously  demanded  a  severe,  vin 
dictive  retribution  ;  and  Lord   Culpepper,   again  obeying  the 
royal  mandate  to  repair  to  Virginia,  caused  a  number  of  the 
insurgents  to  be   tried  for  high  treason,   and  by    a   series    of 
bloody   executions  impressed  that  mute  terror  which   tyrants 
denominate  tranquillity.     Having  thus   enforced   a  submission 
not  more  propitious  to  the  colony  than  the  ferment  which  at 
tended  his  former  departure,  Lord  Culpepper  again  set  sail  for 
England,  where  he  was  immediately  put  in  confinement  for  re 
turning    without  leave  ;  and,  on  a  charge   of  misappropriating 
the  provincial   revenues,  was   shortly   after   arraigned   before 


132  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

a  jury,  and  in   consequence  of  their   verdict   deprived  of  his 
commission.1 

In  displacing  this  nobleman,  it  was  the  injury  done  to  him 
self,  and  not  the  wrongs  of  the  colony,  that  Charles  intended 
to  redress.  The  lasl  exertion  of  his  royal  authority,  which 
Virginia  experienced,  was  the  appointment  of  a  successor  to 
Culpepper,  in  Lord  Effingham  [Aug.  1683],  whose  character 
was  veiy  little  if  at  all  superior,  and  whom,  among  other  in 
structions,  the  king  expressly  commanded  to  suffer  no  person 
within  the  colony  to  employ  a  printing-press  on  any  occasion 
or  pretence  whatsoever.  Along  with  the  new  governor  was 
sent  a  frigate,  which  was  appointed  to  be  stationed  on  the 
coast  with  the  view  of  compelling  a  stricter  execution  of  the 
Navigation  Act  than  this  obnoxious  measure  had  yet  been  able 
to  obtain.2 

On  the  death  of  Charles  the  Second,  his  successor,  James, 
was  proclaimed  [Feb.  1685]  in  Virginia  with  demonstrations 
of  joy,  indicating  less  the  attachment  of  the  colonists  to  the 
person  of  their  new  sovereign,  than  that  impatient  desire  with 
which  men,  under  the  pressure  of  hardship  and  annoyance, 
are  ready  to  hail  any  change  in  their  prospects  or  situation. 
Acclamation  far  more  warmly  expressive  of  gladness  and  hope 
had  attended  the  commencement  of  the  preceding  reign  ;  and 
if  the  hopes  that  were  now  awakened  were  more  moderate, 
they  were  not  on  that  account  the  less  fallacious.  The  colo 
nists  soon  learned  with  regret,  that,  in  his  first  parliament, 
James  had  procured  the  imposition  of  a  tax  on  the  consump 
tion  of  tobacco  in  England  ;  and  in  imploring  the  suspension 
of  this  tax,  which  threatened  still  farther  to  obstruct  the  sale  of 
the  only  vendible  production  of  their  soil,  they  descended  to 
an  abjectness  of  entreaty  which  produced  no  other  effect  than 
to  embitter  their  disappointment  with  the  consciousness  of 
humiliating  and  yet  fruitless  prostration.  Though  the  assembly 
judged  it  expedient  to  present  an  address  of  felicitation  to  the 
king  on  the  defeat  of  Monmouth's  invasion  of  England,  the 
colonists  found  an  opportunity  of  indulging  very  different  senti 
ments  on  that  occasion,  in  the  kindness  with  which  they  treated 

1  Beverley.    Chalmers.  a  Chalmers. 


CHAP.  III.]    TYRANNY  AND  RAPACITY  OF  EFFINGHAM.     133 

some  of  the  insurgents,  whom  James,  from  a  satiety  of  blood 
shed,  which  he  termed  the  plenitude  of  royal  mercy,  appointed 
to  be  transported  to  the  American  plantations  ;  and  even  the 
assembly  paid  no  regard  to  the  signification  of  the  royal  desire 
that  they  should  frame  a  law  to  prevent  these  unfortunate  per 
sons  from  redeeming  themselves  from  the  servitude  to  which 
they  were  consigned.  This  conduct,  however,  of  the  colo 
nists  and  their  assembly,  in  so  far  as  it  was  not  prompted  by 
simple  humanity,  expressed  merely  their  dissatisfaction  with 
the  king's  treatment  of  themselves,  and  denoted  no  partici 
pation  of  their  wishes  or  views  in  the  designs  of  Monmouth. 
The  general  discontent  was  increased  by  the  personal  charac 
ter  of  the  governor  through  whom  the  rays  of  royal  influence 
were  transmitted.  Lord  Effingham,  like  his  predecessor,  in 
grafted  the  baseness  of  a  sordid  disposition  on  the  severity  of 
an  arbitrary  and  despotic  administration.  He  refused  to  con 
voke  the  provincial  assembly.  He  instituted  a  court  of  chan 
cery,  in  which  he  himself  presided  as  judge  ;  and,  besides 
multiplying  and  enhancing  the  fees  attached  to  his  own  peculiar 
functions,  he  condescended  to  share  with  clerks  the  meaner 
perquisites  of  subordinate  office.  For  some  time  he  contrived 
to  stifle  the  remonstrances  which  his  extortions  produced,  by 
the  infliction  of  arbitrary  imprisonment  and  other  tyrannical 
severities  ;  but  at  length  the  public  displeasure  became  so 
general  and  uncontrollable,  that  he  found  it  impossible  to  pre 
vent  the  complaints  of  the  colony  from  being  carried  to  Eng 
land,  —  for  which  country  he  in  consequence  resolved  him 
self  to  embark,  in  order  to  be  present  at  his  own  arraignment. 
[1688.]  He  was  accompanied  by  Colonel  Ludwell,  whom 
the  assembly  appointed  their  agent  to  advocate  the  complaints 
of  his  conduct  and  urge  his  removal  from  office.1 

But  before  the  governor  and  his  accuser  arrived  in  England, 
the  Revolution,  which  the  tyranny  of  James  provoked  in  that 
country,  had  transferred  the  allegiance  of  all  parties  to 'new 
sovereigns.  The  Virginians,  though  they  readily  acquiesced 
in  the  change,  appear  to  have  surveyed  with  very  little  emotion 
an  event  which  coincided  with  none  of  their  anticipations,  and 

1  Beverley.    Oldmixon.     Chalmers. 


134  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

to  the  production  of  which  their  concurrence  had  not  been  de 
manded.  Whatever  might  be  its  remoter  consequences,  its 
immediate  effect  was  forcibly  to  remind  them  of  their  own  in 
significance,  as  the  appendage  of  a  distant  empire,  whose  po 
litical  changes  they  were  fated  to  follow,  but  unable  to  con 
trol.  The  most  deep-seated  and  lasting  grievances  under  which 
they  labored,  having  proceeded  from  the  English  nation  and 
parliament,  were  such  as  the  present  event  gave  no  promise 
of  alleviating.  Their 'immediate  complaints  were  to  be  sub 
mitted  to  sovereigns  of  whom  they  knew  absolutely  nothing  ; 
and  their  late  experience  had  diminished  their  trust  in  princes, 
and  discouraged  hopes  of  advantage  from  changes  of  royalty. 
The  coolness,  then,  with  which  the  Virginians  are  said  to  have 
regarded  the  great  event  of  the  British  Revolution,  so  far 
from  implying  that  their  minds  were  not  touched  with  a  con 
cern  for  freedom,  may,  with  much  greater  probability,  be  re 
ferred  to  the  ardor  with  which  they  cherished  this  generous 
principle,  and  the  deliberate  reflection  which  they  combined 
with  it.1  In  some  respects,  too,  the  policy  of  the  new  govern 
ment  that  arose  in  the  parent  state  was  but  ill  formed  to  convey 
to  them  more  satisfactory  impressions  of  the  change  that  had 
taken  place,  or  to  invite  their  sympathy  with  the  feelings  of 
that  portion  of  their  fellow-subjects  by  whose  exertions  it  was 
accomplished. 

Notwithstanding  the  representations  of  Colonel  Ludwell  (who 
himself  was  gratified  with  the  appointment  of  governor  of  Caro 
lina),  King  William,  disinclined  and  perhaps  unable  to  dismiss 
those  officers  of  his  predecessor  who  were  willing  to  transfer 
their  personal  adherence  and  official  service  to  himself,  re 
tained  Lord  Effingham  in  the  government  of  Virginia.  This 
nobleman,  however,  did  not  again  return  to  the  province  ;  and 
as  long  as  his  commission  was  suffered  to  endure,  the  admin 
istration  was  conducted  by  a  deputy-governor.  He  was  re 
moved  in  the  year  1692,  and  replaced  by  a  successor  still 
more  obnoxious  to  the  colonists,  Sir  Edmund  Andros,  whose 
tyrannical  conduct,  prior  to  the  Revolution,  in  the  government 

1  Colonel  Quarry's  Memorial  to  the  Lords  of  Trade,  in  the  year  1703,  on  the 
state  of  the  American  provinces,  represents  the  Virginian  planters  as  a  nu 
merous  and  wealthy  race,  deeply  infected  with  "  republican  notions  and  prin 
ciples." 


CHAP.  III.]     REMONSTRANCES  OF  THE  VIRGINIANS.  135 

of  other  American  provinces,  more  justly  merited  the  brand  of 
legal  punishment  and  disgrace  than  continuance  of  official  trust 
and  dignity.  If  such  appointments  remind  us  that  the  English 
ministry  was  still  composed  of  many  of  the  persons  who  had 
dispensed  patronage  in  the  preceding  reigns,  they  may  also  in 
part  be  accounted  for  by  other  considerations.  Of  the  offi 
cers  who  were  thus  undeservedly  retained,  some  pretended  to 
great  local  experience  and  official  ability.  This  was  particu 
larly  the  case  of  Sir  Edmund  Andros,  whose  administration 
eventually  proved  highly  beneficial  to  Virginia.  And  they  ex 
cused  the  arbitrary  proceedings  which  they  had  conducted  in 
the  former  reigns,  by  pleading  the  authority  of  the  sovereign 
whose  commands  they  had  obeyed,  —  a  plea  which  always 
finds  favor  with  a  king,  when  not  opposed  to  wrongs  which  he 
deems  personal  to  himself.  Moreover,  the  complaints  of  the 
colonists  were  not  always  accurate ;  for  anger  is  a  more  co 
pious  than  discriminating  accuser.  Justice  suffered,  as  usual, 
from  the  defect  of  temper  and  moderation  with  which  it  was 
invoked  ;  and  the  guilty  artfully  availed  themselves  of  the  in 
considerate  passion  by  which  their  accusers  were  transported, 
in  order  to  defeat  or  discredit  the  charges  which  they  pre 
ferred.  The  insolence  and  severity,  for  example,  that  per 
vaded  the  whole  of  Lord  Effingham's  government,  had  elicited 
many  complaints,  in  which  the  accusers  either  neglected  or 
were  unable  to  discriminate  between  the  legality  of  official 
acts  and  the  tyrannical  demeanour  or  malignant  motives  of  the 
party  by  whom  they  were  performed.  Accordingly,  while 
some  of  the  remonstrances  which  the  Virginians  transmitted 
to  England  by  Colonel  Ludwell  were  favorably  received  and 
approved  by  the  British  government,  there  were  others  that 
produced  only  explanations,  by  which  the  assembly  was  given 
to  understand  that  it  had  mistaken  certain  points  of  English 
constitutional  law.1  In  the  infancy  of  a  free  state,  collisions 
and  disputes  not  unfrequently  arise  from  conflicting  pretensions 
of  different,  but  coordinate,  branches  of  its  municipal  constitu- 

1  Beverley.  Chalmers.  One  of  the  grievances  complained  of  by  the  as 
sembly  of  Virginia  was,  that  Lord  Effingham,  having  by  a  proclamation  de 
clared  the  royal  dissent  to  an  act  of  assembly  which  repealed  a  former  law, 
gave  notice  that  this  law  was  now  in  force.  This  was  erroneously  deemed 
by  the  assembly  an  act  of  legislation. 


136  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

tion,  before  time  has  given  consistence  to  the  whole  structure, 
and  those  relative  limits,  which  abstract  reason  finds  it  difficult 
to  prescribe  to  the  respective  parts,  have  been  determined  by 
the  convenience  of  practice  and  the  authority  of  precedent. 

The  revolution  of  the  British  government,  both  in  its  imme 
diate  and  its  remote  operation,  was  attended  with  consequences 
highly  beneficial  to  Virginia,  in  common  with  all  the  existing 
provinces  of  America.  Under  the  patronage  and  by  the  pecu 
niary  aid  of  William  and  Mary,  the  college  which  had  been 
projected  in  the  reign  of  James  the  First  was  established.1 
The  political  institutions,  under  which  the  manly  character  of 
Englishmen  is  formed,  were  already  planted  in  the  soil  to  which 
so  large  a  portion  of  their  race  had  migrated  ;  the  literary  and 
religious  institutions,  by  which  that  character  is  refined  and 
elevated,  were  now,  in  like  manner,  transported  to  Virginia  ; 
and  a  fountain  opened  within  her  own  territory,  which  prom 
ised  to  dispense  to  her  children  the  streams  of  science,  physi 
cal,  moral,  and  religious. 

But  the  most  important  and  decisive  influence  which  the 
British  Revolution  exercised  on  the  condition  of  the  colonies, 
consisted  in  the  abridgment  and  almost  entire  abolition  of  their 
dependence  on  the  personal  character  of  the  king.  A  con 
servative  principle  was  infused  by  that  great  event  into  the 
main  trunk  of  the  British  constitution  in  England,  and  into  all 
the  filial  shoots  that  had  issued  from  the  parent  stem,  and  ger 
minated  in  the  settlements  abroad.  The  continuity  of  exist 
ence  and  supremacy  of  power,  which  the  parliament  acquired 
in  Britain,  extended  the  constitutional  superintendence  of  this 
national  assembly  to  every  subordinate  organ  of  popular  rights  ; 
and  if  it  oppressed  the  trade,  it  protected  the  chartered  lib 
erties,  of  the  provinces  of  America.  The  king  still  continued 

1  Beverley.  Seymour,  the  English  attorney-general,  having  received  the 
royal  commands  to  prepare  the  charter  of  the  college,  which  was  to  be  ac 
companied  with  a  grant  of  two  thousand  pounds,  remonstrated  against  this  lib 
erality,  protesting  that  the  nation  was  engaged  in  an  expensive  war,  that  the 
money  was  wanted  for  more  important  purposes,  and  that  he  did  not  see  the 
slightest  occasion  for  a  college  in  Virginia.  Blair,  the  commissary  for  the 
Bishop  of  London  in  Virginia,  represented  to  him  that  the  object  of  the  insti 
tution  was  to  educate  and  qualify  young  men  to  be  ministers  of  the  gospel, 
and  begged  Mr.  Attorney  would  consider  that  the  people  of  Virginia  had  souls 
to  be  saved,  as  well  as  the  people  of  England.  "  Souls !  "  said  he  ;  "  damn  your 
souls!  make  tobacco."  —  Franklin's  Correspondence. 


CHAP.  III.]    EFFECTS  OF  THE  BRITISH  REVOLUTION.       137 

to  appoint  the  governors  of  Virginia  and  of  some  of  the  other 
settlements  ;  and  men  of  sordid  dispositions  and  of  feeble  or 
profligate  character  were  frequently  the  objects  of  this  branch 
of  the  royal  patronage.  But  the  powers  of  these  officers  were 
in  general  circumscribed  and  distinctly  defined  ;  and  the  au 
thority  of  the  provincial  assemblies  was  able  to  restrain,  and 
even  overawe,  the  most  vigorous  administration  of  the  execu 
tive  functionaries.  Whatever  evil  influence  a  wicked  or  artful 
governor  might  exert  on  the  domestic  harmony  of  the  people, 
or  on  their  opinions  of  the  royal  prerogative  which  he  admin 
istered,  he  could  commit  no  serious  inroad  on  the  constitution 
of  the  province  over  which  he  presided.  From  this  period  a 
tolerably  equal  and  impartial  policy  distinguished  the  British 
dominion  over  the  American  provinces  ;  the  diminution  of  the 
personal  influence  of  the  sovereign  effaced  in  a  great  degree 
the  inequalities  of  treatment  previously  occasioned  by  the  dif 
ferent  degrees  of  favor  with  which  he  might  happen  to  regard 
the  religious  or  political  sentiments  of  the  inhabitants  of  the 
respective  states  ;  and  consequently  extinguished,  or  at  least 
greatly  abated,  the  jealousies  which  the  several  colonial  com 
munities  had  hitherto  entertained  of  each  other.  A  farther 
abatement  of  these  mutual  jealousies  was  produced  by  the  re 
ligious  toleration  which  the  provincial  governments  were  hence 
forward  compelled  to  observe.  Even  when  intolerant  statutes 
were  permitted  to  subsist,  their  execution  was  generally  disal 
lowed  ;  and  the  principles  cherished  in  one  province  were  no 
longer  exposed  to  persecution  in  another. 

We  must  now  transfer  our  inquiry  to  the  rise  of  the  other 
colonies  in  North  America  which  were  founded  antecedently 
to  the  British  Revolution,  and  trace  their  separate  progress 
till  that  era.  But  before  our  undivided  attention  be  withdrawn 
from  this,  the  earliest  of  the  settlements,  it  seems  proper  to 
subjoin  a  few  particulars  of  its  civil  and  domestic  condition  at 
the  period  at  which  we  have  now  arrived. 

Notwithstanding  the  unfavorable  circumstances  to  which  the 
colony  was  exposed  in  a  greater  or  less  degree  ever  since  the 
Restoration,  the  number  of  its  inhabitants  had  continued  to  in 
crease.  The  deputies  to  Charles  the  Second,  in  1675,  repre 
sented  the  population  as  amounting,  at  that  time,  to  50,000 

VOL.   i.  18 


138  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

persons.1  If  their  statement  were  not  exaggerated  (as  it  prob 
ably  was),  we  must  suppose  that  Bacon's  Rebellion  and  the 
subsequent  tyranny  gave  a  very  severe  check  to  this  rapid  in 
crease  ;  for  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  the  colony  con 
tained  a  much  greater  number  than  50,000  at  the  Revolution 
of  1688.  From  a  table  appended  to  the  first  edition  of  Bev- 
erley's  History,  it  appears,  that,  in  1703,  the  population  of 
Virginia  (exclusive  of  800  French  refugees  conveyed  thither 
by  King  William)  amounted  to  60,606  souls.  Of  this  num 
ber,  20,023  were  tithables  (a  denomination  implying  liability 
to  a  poll  tax,  and  embracing  all  white  men  above  the  age  of 
sixteen,  and  all  negro  slaves,  male  and  female,  above  that  age), 
and  35,583  were  children  of  both  races,  and  white  women. 
The  most  intelligent  and  accomplished  of  the  modern  histo 
rians  of  Virginia  has  conjectured,  that,  at  the  period  of  the 
British  Revolution,  one  half  of  the  population  of  the  province 
consisted  of  slaves.2  Many  circumstances  contributed  to  give 
free  scope  to  the  increase  of  the  provincial  population,  and  to 
counterbalance  the  influence  of  commercial  restraint  and  des 
potic  government.  The  healthfulness  of  the  country  had  great 
ly  improved  ;  and  the  diminution  of  disease  not  only  closed 
a  drain  from  which  the  population  had  severely  suffered,  but 
rendered  the  general  strength  more  available  to  the  general  sup 
port.  The  use  of  tobacco  now  prevailed  extensively  in  Eu 
rope  ;  and  the  diminution  of  its  price  was  compensated  by  the 
increased  demand  for  the  commodity.  In  1671,  it  was  com 
puted,  that,  on  an  average,  eighty  vessels  came  annually  from 
England  and  Ireland  to  Virginia  for  tobacco.  In  1675,  there 
were  exported  from  Virginia  above  23,000  hogsheads  of  to 
bacco,  and  in  the  following  year  upwards  of  25,000.  In  this 
latter  year,  the  customs  on  tobacco  from  Virginia  and  Mary 
land,  collected  in  England,  amounted  to  £135, 000. 3  Sir  Wil 
liam  Berkeley  rates  the  number  of  the  militia,  in  the  year 
1671,  at  nearly  8,000,  and  adds,  that  the  people  were  too 
poor  to  afford  the  equipment  of  cavalry.  In  the  year  1680, 
the  militia  amounted  to  8568,  of  whom  1300  served  as  caval- 

1  Chalmers.  2  Beverley.     Burk. 

3  Chalmers.  In  the  year  1604,  the  whole  customs  of  England  amounted 
only  to  £127,000,  of  winch  £110,000  was  collected  in  the  port  of  London.— 
Hume. 


CHAP.  III.]  CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC   STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.    139 

ry.1  Our  estimate,  however,  of  the  increased  wealth  which 
the  cavalry  establishment  seems  to  indicate,  must  be  abated 
by  the  consideration  of  the  increased  exertions  which  the  In 
dian  war  and  Bacon's  Rebellion  had  rendered  necessary.  In 
the  year  1703,  we  learn  from  Beverley  that  the  militia 
amounted  to  9522,  of  whom  2363  were  light  horse,  and  the 
remainder  foot  and  dragoons  ;  and  that,  as  few  of  the  planters 
were  then  destitute  of  horses,  it  was  judged  that  the  greater 
part  of  them  might,  if  necessary,  be  converted  into  dragoons.2 
Every  freeman  (a  denomination  embracing  all  the  inhabitants, 
except  the  slaves  and  the  indented  servants),  from  sixteen  to 
sixty  years  of  age,  was  enrolled  in  the  militia  ;  and  as  the 
people  were  much  accustomed  to  shoot  in  the  woods,  they 
were  universally  expert  in  the  use  of  firearms.3  The  mi 
litia  was  commanded  by  the  governor,  whose  salary  was  £  1000 
a  year,  till  the  appointment  of  Lord  Culpepper,  who,  on  the 
plea  of  peerage,  procured  it  to  be  doubled.4 

The  twelve  provincial  counsellors,  as  well  as  the  governor, 
were  appointed  by  the  king  ;  and  a  salary  of  £  350,  assigned 
to  the  council,  was  divided  in  proportion  to  the  official  ser 
vices  which  the  members  respectively  performed.  In  all  mat 
ters  of  importance,  the  concurrence  of  the  council  with  the 
governor  was  indispensably  requisite.  The  provincial  assem 
bly  was  composed  of  the  counsellors,  who  termed  themselves 
the  Upper  House,  and  claimed  privileges  correspondent  with 
those  exercised  by  the  English  House  of  Lords  ;  and  the  bur 
gesses,  who  were  elected  by  the  freemen  of  the  respective 
counties,  and  performed  the  functions  of  the  House  of  Com 
mons,  receiving  wages  proportioned  to  their  services,  and  de 
rived,  like  all  the  other  provincial  salaries,  from  provincial  tax 
ation.  A  poll  tax  long  continued  to  be  the  only  domestic 
tribute  imposed  on  the  Virginians  ;  and  subjection  to  this  tax 
inferred  the  qualification  of  a  freeman.  The  poorer  classes 
were  reconciled  to  the  poll  tax  by  this  identification  of  its  bur 
den  with  the  enjoyment  of  the  political  franchise,  and  by  the 
specious  application  of  a  maxim  which  became  current  in  the 
colony,  that  the  lives  and  industry  of  the  citizens  were  objects 

1  Chalmers.        *  Beverley.'        3  Beverley  (edit.  1722).         *  Beverley. 


140  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

of  greater  value  than  lands  and  houses.  Until  the  year  1680, 
the  several  branches  of  the  assembly  had  collectively  formed 
one  deliberative  body  ;  but  in  that  year  the  counsellors  separ 
ated  themselves  from  the  burgesses,  and  assumed  a  distinct 
political  existence.  In  conjunction  with  the  governor,  the 
counsellors  formed  the  supreme  tribunal  of  the  province  ;  from 
whose  judgments,  however,  in  all  cases  involving  more  than 
£  300,  an  appeal  was  permitted  to  the  king  and  privy  council 
of  England.  In  1681,  the  province  contained  twenty  coun 
ties  ;  in  1703,  it  contained  twenty-five.  A  quitrent  of  two 
shillings  for  every  hundred  acres  of  land  was  paid  by  the  plant 
ers  to  the  crown.1 

In  the  year  1688,  the  province  contained  forty-eight  par 
ishes,  embracing  upwards  of  200,000  acres  of  appropriated 
land.  A  church  was  built  in  every  parish,  and  a  house  and 
glebe  assigned  to  the  clergyman,  along  with  a  stipend,  which 
was  fixed  by  law  at  16,000  pounds  of  tobacco.  This  mode 
of  remuneration  obviously  tends  to  give  a  secular  cast  to  the 
life  and  character  of  the  ministers,  and  to  entangle  them  with 
concerns  remote  from  their  spiritual  duties.  The  equalization 
which  it  proposes  is  deceptive  ;  the  different  degrees  of  fer 
tility  of  different  parishes  rendering  the  burden  unequal  to  the 
people,  and  the  varying  quality  of  the  tobacco  produced  in 
various  soils  making  the  remuneration  unequal  to  the  clergy 
men.  The  privilege  of  collating  to  ecclesiastical  benefices, 
prior  to  the  British  Revolution,  belonged  to  the  governor,  but 
was  generally  usurped  or  controlled  by  the  parishioners.  After 
the  British  Revolution,  it  was  grasped  by  the  hands  of  parochial 
vestries,  which,  though  originally  elected  by  the  people,  came, 
in  process  of  time,  to  exercise  the  power  of  supplying  vacan 
cies  in  their  numbers  by  their  own  appointment.  The  bishop 
of  London  was  accounted  the  diocesan  of  the  province  ;  and 
a  resident  commissary  (generally  a  member  of  the  council) ,  ap 
pointed  by  that  prelate,  presided  over  the  clergy,  with  the 
power  of  convoking,  censuring,  and  even  suspending  them  from 
the  exercise  of  their  ministry.  The  doctrines  and  rites  of  the 
church  of  England  were  established  by  law  ;  attendance  at 

1  Chalmers.     Burk. 


CHAP.  III.]   CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     141 

divine 'worship  in  the  parochial  churches,  and  participation  in 
the  sacraments  of  the  church,  were  enjoined  under  heavy  pen 
alties  ;  the  preaching  of  dissenters,  and  participation  in  the  rites 
and  worship  of  dissenting  congregations,  were  prohibited,  and 
subjected  to  various  degrees  of  punishment.  There  was  one 
bloody  statute,  which  menaced  Quakers  returning  from  banish 
ment  with  the  punishment  of  death  ;  but  no  execution  ever 
took  place  in  consequence  of  this  law,  and  it  was  repealed 
soon  after  the  Revolution  of  1688.  The  other  intolerant  laws 
were  not  then  abolished,  but  they  were  no  longer  strictly  or 
generally  executed  ;  and  though  the  statute-book  continued  to 
forbid  the  promulgation  of  tenets  and  performance  of  worship 
dissenting  from  the  established  model,  the  prohibition  was  little 
regarded,  and  a  practical  liberty  of  conscience  was  considerably 
realized.  In  1688,  a  great  majority  of  the  people  belonged  to 
the  established  church.  Other  opinions  and  practices,  how 
ever,  began  to  arise,  and  were  doubtless  promoted  by  the  in 
fluence  of  the  free  schools,  of  which  a  great  many  were  founded 
and  endowed  soon  after  that  period  ;  and  the  provincial  gov 
ernment,  being  restrained  from  executing  the  intolerant  laws 
against  dissenters,  endeavoured  to  cherish  the  ecclesiastical 
establishment  by  heaping  temporal  advantages  upon  its  minis 
ters.  This  policy  produced  its  usual  fruits,  and  generated  in 
the  state  clergy  a  spirit  and  character  so  odiously  contrasted, 
and  so  inadequate  to  cope,  with  the  zeal  and  diligence  of  dis 
senting  teachers  stimulated  by  the  most  powerful  motives  both 
temporal  and  spiritual,  that  at  the  era  of  the  American  Revo 
lution  two  thirds  of  the  inhabitants  of  Virginia  had  become  dis 
senters  from  the  episcopal  church,  and  were  obnoxious,  on  that 
account,  to  the  ban  of  their  own  municipal  law.1 

Of  every  just  and  humane  system  of  laws  one  main  object 
should  be  to  protect  the  weak  against  the  strong,  and  to  temper 
and  correct,  instead  of  promoting  and  perpetuating,  the  inequali- 

1  Abridgment  of  the  Laws  of  Virginia.  Beverley.  Burnaby's  Travels  through 
the  Middle  Settlements  of  America.  Chalmers.  Jefferson's  Notes  on  Virginia. 
From  the  Journal  of  Thomas  Chalkley,  the  Quaker,  it  appears  that  many  of 
his  fellow-sectaries  were  peaceably  and  happily  established  in  Virginia  before 
the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Among  these,  he  mentions  one  Porter, 
who  (in  the  year  1698),  at  the  age  of  ninety-two,  had  a  daughter  two  years 
old.  Porter  died  at  the  age  of  a  hundred  and  seven,  full  of  days,  wisdom,  and 
piety,  leaving  seventy  descendants  in  the  province. 


142  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   I. 

ties  of  social  condition  created  from  time  to  time  by  inequalities 
of  human  strength,  skill,  success,  or  industry.  This  wise  and 
benevolent  principle  must  be  sacrificed,  to  a  considerable  ex 
tent,  in  the  code  of  every  country  where  slavery  is  admitted. 
By  the  laws  of  Virginia,  all  persons  arriving  voluntarily  or 
involuntarily  in  the  colony  by  sea  or  land,  not  having  been 
Christians  in  their  native  country,  were  subjected  to  slavery, 
even  though  they  might  be  converted  to  Christianity  after  their 
arrival.  A  slave  accused  of  a  capital  crime  was  remitted  to 
the  judgment  of  commissioners  named  by  the  governor,  without 
the  intervention  of  a  jury  ;  and  if  the  punishment  of  death  were 
inflicted,  indemnification  to  the  extent  of  the  pecuniary  value  of 
the  slave  was  awarded  from  the  provincial  treasury  to  the  mas 
ter.  This  last  regulation  has  prevailed  in  every  State  into 
which  negro  slavery  has  gained  admission  ;  notwithstanding  its 
manifest  tendency  to  injure  the  public  by  relaxing  the  domestic 
vigilance  of  masters,  and  its  injustice  to  the  slaves  in  weaken 
ing  the  slight  but  sole  security  of  humane  treatment  which  they 
derive  from  the  pecuniary  interest  of  their  owners  in  the  pres 
ervation  of  their  lives.  In  the  year  1669,  it  was  enacted  that 
the  death  of  a  slave  occasioned  by  the  correction  of  a  master 
should  not  be  accounted  felony  ;  "  since  it  cannot  be  pre 
sumed,"  says  the  act,  "  that  prepensed  malice,  which  alone 
makes  murder  felony,  should  induce  any  man  to  destroy  his 
own  estate."  But  reason  and  experience  alike  refute  this  per 
nicious  sophistry,  which  ascribes  to  absolute  power  a  tendency 
to  repress  human  irascibility,  and  accounts  avarice  and  selfish 
ness  sufficient  motives  and  pledges  of  justice,  humanity,  and 
moderation.  Neither  infidels  nor  negroes,  mulattoes  nor  In 
dians,  were  allowed  to  purchase  Christian  white  servants  ;  and 
if  any  person,  having  Christian  white  servants,  should  marry  an 
infidel,  or  a  negro,  mulatto,  or  Indian,  all  such  servants  were 
made  free.  Any  free  white  person  intermarrying  with  a  negro 
or  mulatto,  and  any  minister  celebrating  such  marriage,  were 
punished  with  fine  and  imprisonment. 

It  will  excite  the  merriment  of  a  satirist,  the  disgust  of  a 
philosopher,  and  the  indignant  concern  of  a  Christian,  to  see, 
combined  with  such  inhuman  and  tyrannical  laws,  the  strictest 
injunctions  of  the  worship  of  that  great  Teacher  of  charity  and 


CHAP.  III.]   CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     143 

humility  who  commanded  his  worshippers  to  honor  all  men  ; 
together  with  many  solemn  denunciations  and  penal  enactments 
against  travelling  on  Sunday,  profane  cursing,  and  profanely 
getting  drunk.  Justices  of  the  peace  were  commanded  to 
hear  and  determine  the  complaints  of  all  servants,  except  slaves, 
against  their  masters.  Various  regulations  were  established 
for  securing  mild  and  equitable  treatment  to  indented  servants  ; 
at  the  close  of  their  indentures,  they  received  from  their  mas 
ters  each  a  musket,  a  small  sum  of  money,  and  a  quantity  of 
corn  ;  but  if,  during  the  currency  of  their  term  of  service,  they 
presumed  to  marry  without  consent  of  their  master  or  mistress, 
they  were  punished  with  an  additional  year  of  servitude.  To 
divert  the  planters  from  employing  female  indented  servants  in 
agricultural  labor,  it  was  decreed  that  all  white  women  ex 
empted  from  such  labor  should  be  also  exempted  from  poll 
tax,  but  that  any  of  them  who  might  be  employed  in  rustic  toil 
should  forthwith  be  enrolled  in  the  list  of  tithables.  All  per 
sons  riotously  assembling,  to  the  number  of  eight  or  more,  for 
the  purpose  of  destroying  tobacco,  incurred  the  guilt  of  trea 
son.  Every  person,  not  being  a  servant  or  slave,  committing 
adultery  or  fornication,  was  for  the  greater  offence  fined  one 
thousand,  and  for  the  lesser,  five  hundred,  pounds  of  tobacco. 
Women  convicted  of  slander  were  adjudged  to  be  ducked,  in 
default  of  their  husbands'  consenting  to  redeem  them  from  the 
penal  immersion  at  the  cost  of  a  pecuniary  mulct.  There 
being  no  inns  in  the  country,  strangers  were  entertained  at  the 
houses  of  the  inhabitants,  and  were  frequently  involved  in  lawr- 
suits  by  the  exorbitant  claims  of  their  hosts  for  indemnification 
of  the  expenses  of  their  mercenary  hospitality  ;  for  remedy 
whereof,  it  was  ordained,  that  an  inhabitant,  neglecting  in  such 
circumstances  to  forewarn  his  guest  and  to  make  an  express 
compact  with  him,  should  be  reputed  to  have  entertained  him 
from  mere  courtesy  and  benevolence.1  All  the  foregoing  laws 
continued  in  force  long  after  the  British  Revolution. 

It  appears  from  the  first  of  these  statutes,  that  Indians  visit 
ing  the  territories  of  the  State  were  liable  to  be  enslaved  by 
the  colonists  ;  and  in  Jefferson's  statistical  account  of  Vir- 

1  Abridgment  of  the  Laws  of  Virginia.    Beverley.     Burk. 


144  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ginia,  it  is  admitted  that  the  practice  of  subjecting  those  sav 
ages  to  slavery  did  at  one  time  actually  prevail.1  But  with  the 
Indian  tribes  situated  in  their  immediate  vicinity,  and  compre 
hended  in  the  pacification  negotiated  by  Colonel  Jeffreys,  the 
colonists  maintained  relations  more  approaching  to  friendship 
and  equality.  The  Indians  paid,  indeed,  in  conformity  with 
the  treaty  of  peace,  an  annual  tribute  of  beaver-skins  to  the 
provincial  government.2  But  their  territories  were  ascertained 
by  the  treaty,  and  secured  to  them  by  the  guaranty  of  the 
provincial  laws  ;  and  every  wrong  they  might  sustain  at  the 
hands  of  any  of  the  colonists  was  punished  in  the  same  manner 
as  if  it  had  been  done  to  an  Englishman.3  By  the  aid  of  a 
donation  from  that  distinguished  religious  philosopher,  Robert 
Boyle,  an  attempt  was  made  to  render  the  institution,  which, 
from  its  founders,  has  been  called  William  and  Mary  College, 
subservient  to  the  instruction  of  the  Indians.  Some  young 
persons,  belonging  to  the  friendly  tribes,  received  at  this  sem 
inary  the  rudiments  of  civil  and  religious  education  ;  and  the 
colonists,  sensible  of  the  advantages  they  derived  from  possess 
ing  in  the  persons  of  such  pupils  the  most  valuable  hostages  of 
the  pacific  demeanour  of  their  parents,  prevailed  with  some  of 
the  more  remote  nations  of  the  Indians  to  send  a  few  of  their 
children  to  drink  of  the  same  fountain  of  knowledge.  But  as 
the  pupils  were  restored  to  their  parent  tribes,  when  they  at 
tained  the  age  that  fitted  them  for  hunting  and  warlike  exer 
cises,  it  is  not  likely  that  the  course  of  collegiate  instruction 
which  they  pursued  produced  any  wide  or  permanent  impres 
sion  on  the  character  of  the  Indians,  or  made  any  adequate 
compensation  for  the  destructive  vices  and  diseases  which  the 
Europeans  were  unhappily  much  more  successful  in  imparting.4 
Attempts  to  convert  barbarians  very  frequently  disappoint 
their  promoters  ;  and  not  those  persons  only  who  have  assisted 

1  Notes  on  Virginia.  2  Beverley. 

3  Abridgment  of  the  Laws  of  Virginia.     "  That  the  lands  of  this  country 
were  taken  from  the  Indians  by  conquest  is  not  so  general  a  truth  as  is  sup 
posed.  I  find,  in  our  historians  and  records,  repeated  proofs  of  purchases  which 
cover  a  considerable  part  of  the  lower  country  ;  and  many  more  would  doubt 
less  be  found  on  farther  search.      The  upper  country,  we  know,   has  been 
acquired  altogether  by  purchases  made  in  the  most  unexceptionable  form."  — 
Notes  on  Virginia. 

4  Beverley  (edit.  1722).     In  citing  this  author,  it  is  the  edition  of  1705  that 
I  refer  to,  when  the  other  is  not  expressly  named. 


CHAP.  III.]   CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     145 

the  undertaking  from  merely  secular  ends,  but  those  also,  who, 
truly  regarding  the  divine  glory  in  the  end,  disregard,  at  least 
in  some  measure,  the  divine  agency  in  the  means.  As  an 
instrument  of  temporal  improvement  merely,  and  civilization, 
the  preaching  of  the  gospel  will  ever  be  found  to  disappoint  all 
those  who  have  no  higher  or  ulterior  views.  In  a  civilized  and 
Christian  land,  the  great  bulk  of  the  people  are  Christians 
merely  in  name  ;  reputation,  convenience,  and  habit  are  the 
sources  of  their  religious  denomination  ;  an  early  and  habitual 
familiarity  with  mysterious  doctrine  evades  the  difficulty  of  rea 
sonable  assent  to  it  ;  vices  are  so  disguised,  that  the  testimonies 
of  Christian  preachers  against  them  often  miss  their  aim  ;  and  a 
professed  devotedness  to  the  service  of  piety  and  the  pursuit  of 
spiritual  good  is  easily  reconciled  with,  and  esteemed  a  decent 
livery  of,  more  real  and  substantial  devotion  to  all  that  is 
worldly,  selfish,  and  sensual.  But  among  heathens  and  sav 
ages,  a  convert  to  Christianity  must  change  his  style  of  life, 
overcome  his  habits,  renounce  his  opinions,  and  forfeit  his 
reputation  ;  and  none,  or  at  least  very  few,  become  professors, 
except  from  the  influence  of  real  conviction,  more  or  less  last 
ing  and  profound.  Those  who  remain  unconverted,  if  they  be 
honestly  addressed  by  the  missionary  preachers,  are  incensed 
at  the  testimony  against  their  evil  deeds  and  sullied  nature  ; 
and  the  conduct  of  many  professing  Christians  among  their 
civilized  neighbours  too  often  contributes  to  mislead  and  con 
firm  them  in  error.  But  this  topic  will  derive  an  ampler  illus 
tration  from  occurrences  that  relate  to  others  of  the  North 
American  States  than  the  early  history  of  Virginia  is  fitted  to 
supply. 

t  Literature  was  but  very  slightly  cultivated  in  Virginia.  There 
was  not  at  this  period,  nor  for  many  years  after,  a  single  book 
seller's  shop  in  the  colony.1  Yet  a  history  of  Virginia  was 
written  some  years  after  by  Beverley,  a  native  of  the  province, 
who  had  taken  an  active  part  in  public  affairs  prior  to  the 

1  The  literature  of  North  America  was  at  this  time  monopolized  almost 
entirely  by  New  England.  In  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  when 
Boston  contained  five  printing-offices  and  many  booksellers'  shops,  there  was 
but  one  bookseller's  shop  in  New  York,  and  not  one  in  Virginia,  Maryland,  or 
Carolina.  Neal's  History  of  New  England.  Even  in  the  provincial  towns 
of  the  parent  state  booksellers'  shops  were  very  rare  at  this  period.  Bos- 
well's  Life  of  Johnson. 

VOL.    I.  19 


146  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

Revolution  of  1688.  The  first  edition  of  this  work  in  1705, 
and  a  later  edition  in  1722,  were  published  in  England. 
Beverley  is  a  brief  and  somewhat  agreeable  annalist,  and  has 
appended  to  his  narrative  of  events  an  account  of  the  institu 
tions  of  the  province,  and  of  the  manners  of  the  colonial  and 
aboriginal  inhabitants.  He  is  chargeable  with  great  ignorance 
and  incorrectness  in  those  parts  of  his  story  that  embrace 
events  occurring  in  England,  or  elsewhere  beyond  the  imme 
diate  precincts  of  Virginia.  Only  the  initial  letters  of  his  name 
appear  on  the  title-page  of  his  book,  —  whence  Oldmixon  was 
led  into  the  mistake  of  supposing  his  name  to  have  been  Bul 
lock  ;  and  in  some  of  the  critical  catalogues  of  Germany  he 
has  received  the  erroneous  appellation  of  Bird.1  A  much 
more  enlarged  and  elaborate  history  of  Virginia  (but,  unfor 
tunately,  carried  no  further  down  than  the  year  1624)  was 
written  at  a  later  period  by  Stith,  also  a  native  of  the  province, 
and  one  of  the  governors  of  William  and  Mary  College.  Stith 
is  a  candid,  accurate  historian,  and  accomplished  scholar  ; 
tediously  minute  in  relating  the  debates  in  the  Court  of  Pro 
prietors  of  the  Virginia  Company,  and  their  disputes  with  the 
king  ;  but  generally  impressive  and  interesting.  A  manly  and 
liberal  spirit  pervades  every  page  of  his  work,  which  was  first 
published  at  Williamsburg  in  1747. 

Beverley  warmly  extols  the  hospitality  of  his  countrymen  ; 
a  commendation  which  the  peculiarity  of  their  condition  ren 
ders  sufficiently  credible,  though  the  preamble  of  one  of  their 
laws,  which  we  have  already  noticed,  demonstrates  that  its  ap 
plication  was  by  no  means  universal.  He  reproaches  them 
with  indolence,  which  he  ascribes  to  their  residence  in  scat 
tered  dwellings,  and  their  destitution  of  that  collected  life  which 
promotes  mutual  cooperation  and  competition,  invigorates  in 
dustry,  and  nourishes  the  spirit  of  adventurous  enterprise.  It 
may  be  ascribed,  also,  to  the  influence  of  slavery  in  fostering 
pride  and  discrediting  labor.  A  life  like  that  of  the  first  Vir- 

1  Warden,  a  late  American  writer,  has  repeated  this  error,  and  described  as 
the  production  of  Bird  what  in  reality  was  the  first  edition  of  Beverley's 
work.  There  really  was  a  history  of  Virginia  written  and  published  by  a 
Colonel  Bird,  in  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century;  but  I  have  never 
been  able  to  meet  with  it.  Oldmixon  (in  his  Preface)  gives  some  account  of 
the  author,  and  refers  to  his  work  among  the  other  materials  which  he  himself 
had  made  use  of. 


CHAP.  III.]    CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     147 

ginian  colonists,  remote  from  crowded  haunt,  unoccupied  by  a 
multitude  and  variety  of  objects  and  purposes,  sequestered  from 
the  intelligence  of  passing  events,  and  yet  connected,  by  origin, 
remembrance,  and  interest,  with  a  distant  and  distinguished 
realm,  is  the  life  of  those  to  whom  the  company  of  strangers  is 
peculiarly  acceptable.  All  the  other  circumstances  of  such  a 
lot  contribute  to  the  promotion  of  hospitable  habits.  As  for 
many  of  their  hours  the  inhabitants  can  find  no  more  interesting 
occupation,  so  of  much  of  their  superfluous  produce  they  can 
find  no  more  profitable  use,  than  the  entertainment  of  visitors.1 
It  was  the  remarkable  and  fortunate  peculiarity  of  their  local 
situation,  that  prevented  a  people  so  early  devoted  to  com 
merce  as  the  Virginians  from  congregating  in  large  towns  and 
forming  marts  of  trade.  The  same  peculiarity  characterized 
that  portion  of  their  original  territory  which  was  subsequently 
formed  into  the  separate  province  of  Maryland  ;  and  there, 
too,  it  was  attended  with  similar  effects.  The  whole  of  that 
vast  region  is  pervaded  by  numerous  streams,  that  impart  fer 
tility  to  the  land,  and  carry  the  produce  they  have  promoted  to 
the  great  highway  of  nations.  From  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake, 
where  all  those  streams  unite,  the  greater  number  of  them 
afford  an  extensive  navigation  into  the  interior  of  the  country  ; 
and  the  colonists,  perceiving  that  in  order  to  embark  the  pro 
duce  of  their  land  they  needed  not  to  quit  their  plantations, 
but  might  load  the  merchant  ships  at  the  doors  of  their  country 
warehouses,  dispersed  themselves2  along  the  banks  of  the  rivers, 
and  united  the  healthful  felicity  of  rural  life  with  the  advantages 
of  commerce.  Except  the  small  towns  of  Williamsburg, 
which  succeeded  Jamestown  as  the  capital  of  Virginia,  and 
Annapolis,  the  capital  of  Maryland,  no  cities  grew  up  for  a 
very  long  period  in  either  of  these  provinces.  This  social  con 
dition  proved  highly  favorable  to  those  two  great  sources  of 
national  happiness,  —  good  morals,  and  the  facility  of  gaining 
by  industry  a  moderate  competence  and  a  respectable  station 

1  "  Mr.  Jefferson  told  me,  that  in  his  father's  time  it  was  no  uncommon 
thing  for  gentlemen  to  post  their  servants  on  the  main  road  for  the  purpose  of 
amicably  waylaying  and  bringing  to  their  houses  any  travellers  who  might 
chance  to  pass.    —  Hall's  Travels  in  Canada  and  the  United  States. 

2  "  But,  as  the  bees  which  have  no  hive  collect  no  honey,  the  commerce 
which  was  thus  dispersed  accumulated  no  wealth."  —  Tucker's  Life  of  Jef 
ferson. 


148  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

in  society.  The  convicts  who  were  transported  to  the  colo 
ny,  finding  none  of  the  opportunities  of  confederacy,  pillage, 
and  concealment,  that  large  towns  afford,  either  returned  to 
Europe  at  the  expiration  of  their  periods  of  service,  or,  im 
pressed  with  the  advantages  which  the  country  so  liberally  ten 
dered  to  honest  toil  and  sobriety  of  manners,  they  melted  into 
the  mass  of  humble  and  respectable  free  laborers.  To  this 
important  class  of  society  the  virtues  of  industry  and  economy 
were  recommended  by  prizes  both  greater  and  nearer  than 
any  other  social  community  ever  before  presented.  Labor  was 
so  valuable,  and  land  so  cheap,  that  a  very  few  years  of  diligent 
exertion  could  promote  the  laborer  to  the  condition  of  a  land 
owner  ; l  no  one  needed  to  despair  of  a  competence  ;  and 
none  found  it  practicable  to  amass  enormous  wealth.  Man 
ual  work,  no  longer  the  badge  of  hopeless  poverty,  was  re 
spected  as  the  certain  passport  to  independence  ;  nor  was 
there  among  the  free  population  any  distinction  of  rank  which 
industry  and  virtue  were  unable  to  surmount.  A  constant  and 
general  progression,  accomplished  without  scramble  or  peril, 
gave  a  quiet  alacrity  to  life  ;  and  fellow-feeling  was  not  ob 
structed,  nor  insolence  and  servility  engendered,  by  numerous 
instances  of  a  wide  inequality  of  condition.  They  were,  and 
are,  undoubtedly,  a  happy  people. 

Two  causes,  however,  have  contributed,  in  this  and  others 
of  the  American  provinces,  to  impede  the  operation  and 
abridge  the  influence  of  circumstances  so  favorable  to  happi 
ness  and  virtue.  Of  these,  by  far  the  most  important  is  the  in 
stitution  of  domestic  slavery  ;  a  practice  fraught  with  incalcu 
lable  evil  to  the  morals,  manners,  and  felicity  of  every  country 
into  which  it  has  gained  admission.  The  slaves  are  reduced 
to  a  state  of  misery  and  degradation  ;  to  a  state  which  ex 
perience  has  pronounced  sb  destructive  to  virtue,  that,  in  many 
languages,  the  condition  of  a  slave  and  the  character  of  a  thief 
are  expressed  by  the  same  word.  The  experience  of  every 
age  has  confirmed  the  maxim  of  Homer,  that  the  day  which 

1  "  I  remember  the  time  when  five  pounds  were  left  by  a  charitable  testator 
to  the  poor  of  the  parish  he  lived  in  ;  and  it  lay  nine  years  before  the  execu 
tors  could  find  one  poor  enough  to  be  entitled  to  any  part  of  this  legacy ;  and 
at  last  it  was  all  given  to  one  old  woman.  So  that  this  may  in  truth  be 
termed  the  best  poor  man's  country  in  the  world."  —  Beverley. 


CHAP.  III.]    CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     149 

makes  man  a  slave  takes  half  his  worth  away.  The  masters 
are  justly  loaded  with  the  guilt  of  all  the  wretchedness  and 
worthlessness  which  the  condition  of  slavery  inevitably  infers  ; 
every  mind  is  tainted  with  the  evil  which  it  engenders  and  dis 
plays,  and  sustains  an  abatement  either  of  happiness  or  virtue. 
Every  master  of  a  slave,  whether  he  term  himself  citizen  or 
subject,  is  a  monarch  endowed  with  more  uncontrolled  authori 
ty  than  any  sovereign  in  Europe  enjoys  ;  and  every  country 
where  slavery  is  admitted,  whether  it  call  itself  kingdom  or 
republic,  is  a  country  subject  to  the  dominion  of  tyrants. 
Nay,  the  more  liberal  its  political  constitution,  the  more  severe 
in  general  is  its  system  of  domestic  tyranny  ;  and  the  expe 
rience  of  every  age  has  verified  the  Grecian  proverb,  that  none 
are  so  completely  enslaved  as  the  slaves  of  the  free.  Human 
character  is  as  much  corrupted  and  depraved  by  the  arrogance 
of  domination  as  by  the  depression  of  servitude  ;  and  slavery 
is  a  state  wherein  one  man  ruleth  over  another  to  his  own  hurt. 
The  same  wisdom  which  assigned  to  man  his  duties  adapted 
them  to  the  development  of  his  understanding  and  the  refine 
ment  of  his  sensibility.  This  adaptation  is  particularly  visible 
in  the  duties  that  regulate  the  mutual  intercourse  of  men.  To 
violate  therein  the  law  of  kindness  and  the  principles  of  equity 
is  to  warp  the  understanding,1  as  well  as  to  corrupt  the  heart  ; 
to  lower  the  dignity  of  rational,  and  the  happiness  of  sensible 
beings.  There  is  a  perpetual  reciprocation  of  evil  between  a 
master  and  his  slaves.  His  injustice  consigns  them  to  their 
servile  state  ;  and  the  evil  qualities  that  this  condition  engen 
ders  in  them  tend  continually  to  provoke  his  irascibility.  His 
power  inflicts  their  degradation  ;  and  their  degradation  at  once 
provokes  and  facilitates  the  excesses  of  his  power.  In  pro 
portion  to  the  rigor  of  their  treatment  is  the  hatred  which  he 
inspires  in  them,  and  which,  reacting  on  its  own  dire  cause,  im 
parts  a  wider  scope  and  keener  edge  to  his  cruelty.  Hence 
the  commerce  between  master  and  slave  tends  to  stimulate 
and  exhibit  all  that  is  odious  and  revolting  in  human  passion 
and  conduct.  The  delicate  susceptibility  of  women  is  ex 
posed  to  the  impression  of  this  spectacle,  and  the  imitative 

1  See  Note  IV.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 


150  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

disposition  of  children  exercised  amidst  its  continual  display. 
In  the  picture  that  Juvenal  has  drawn  of  the  toilet  of  a  Roman 
lady  we  behold  a  striking  illustration  of  the  influence  of  do 
mestic  slavery  in  corrupting  even  the  gentler  sex  with  the 
direst  cruelty  ;  and  that  the  picture  was  far  from  being  over 
charged  may  unhappily  be  deduced  from  the  delineations,  still 
more  odious,  that  present  themselves  in  the  pages  of  modern 
travellers  in  North  America  and  the  West  Indies.  Female 
slaves,  regarding  the  freemen  as  a  superior  race  of  beings, 
lose  alike  the  virtues  and  the  rights  of  women  in  their  inter 
course  with  them,  and  introduce  into  rural  life  modes  of  vice 
even  more  disgraceful  and  corruptive  than  those  which  are 
generated  by  the  temptations  of  profligate  cities.  The  free 
men,  habituated  to  consider  the  great  majority  of  the  females 
with  whom  they  associate  as  an  inferior  race,  are  consequently 
exposed  to  an  influence  hostile  to  those  sentiments  and  man 
ners  which  constitute  the  moral  grace  and  symbol  of  civilized 
life  ;  and  proportionally  descend  to  the  level  of  that  barbarous 
state  in  which  women  are  regarded  merely  as  instruments  of 
drudgery  or  ministers  of  voluptuousness.  Every  description 
of  work  that  is  committed  to  slaves  is  performed  with  as 
much  neglect  and  indolence  as  they  dare  to  indulge,  and  is 
so  degraded  in  common  estimation,  that  the  poorest  freeman 
disdains  to  undertake  it  except  when  he  is  working  for  himself. 
White  servants  in  America  have  been  always  distinguished  for 
a  jealous  impatience  of  their  position,  and  a  reluctant  and  im 
perfect  regard  to  the  will  of  their  masters.  As  the  numbers 
of  the  slaves  are  multiplied,  the  industry  of  the  free  is  thus  re 
pressed  by  the  extension  of  slave  labor  ;  and  the  safety  of  the 
state  is  endangered  by  the  strength  of  a  body  of  internal  ene 
mies  ready  to  conspire  against  its  tranquillity  or  to  join  its  first 
invader.1  The  number  of  the  slaves  and  gladiators  contributed 

1  "  I  tremble  for  my  country,"  says  Jefferson,  in  his  observations  on  the 
slave  population  of  this  province,  "  when  I  reflect  that  God  is  just ;  that  his 
justice  cannot  sleep  for  ever  ;  that,  considering  numbers,  nature,  and  natural 
means  only,  a  revolution  of  the  wheel  of  fortune,  an  exchange  of  situation, 
is  among  possible  events  ;  that  it  may  become  probable  by  supernatural  inter 
ference  !  The  Almighty  has  no  attribute  which  can  take  side  with  us  in  such  a 
contest."  Notes  on  Virginia.  So  early  as  the  year  1687,  we  are  told  that 
"  a  plan  of  insurrection  of  the  blacks  was  at  this  time  discovered  in  the  North 
ern  Neck,  just  in  time  to  prevent  its  explosion."  Burk.  Seneca  relates 


CHAP.  III.]   CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.     151 

to  the  downfall  of  Rome  ;  and,  indeed,  every  body  politic,  com 
pounded  of  parts  so  heterogeneous  as  freemen  and  slaves,  plain 
ly  contains  within  itself  a  principle  of  progressive  disease  and 
corruption.  Such  a  mixture  tends  also  to  pervert  and  con 
found  the  moral  sentiments  of  all  mankind,  and  to  degrade  the 
value  of  those  free  institutions  which  are  seen  to  form  a  canopy 
for  the  shelter  of  domestic  tyranny,1  to  mock  one  portion  of 
the  people  with  such  liberty  and  dignity  as  jailers  enjoy,  and  to 
load  all  the  rest  with  such  fetters  as  only  felons  should  wear. 

Of  all  the  forms  under  which  slavery  has  ever  appeared  in 
the  world,  negro  slavery  is  the  most  odious  and  mischievous. 
The  difference  of  color  aggravates  the  distinction  of  condition 
between  the  master  and  the  slave  ;  and  the  mutual  hatred  and 
fear  generated  between  individuals  by  this  accidental  relation 
are  extended  to  natural  distinctions  of  bodily  feature,  and  per 
petuated  between  whole  races  of  men.  Long  as  well  as 
grievous  are  the  consequences  of  guilt  and  injustice.  The 
first  introduction  of  slavery  into  a  country  plants  a  canker, 
of  which  the  .entire  malignity  is  not  perceived  till  in  an  after 
age,  when  it  has  attained  an  extent,  which,  concurring  with 
the  attendant  train  of  prejudices  and  antipathies,  renders  its 
extirpation  exceedingly  difficult.  This  consideration,  without 
tending  to  diminish  our  abhorrence  of  a  system  so  fraught 
with  mischief  and  danger,  mitigates  the  severity  of  our  cen 
sure  on  those  to  whom  the  system,  already  matured  by  long 
continuance  and  fortified  by  inveterate  prejudice,  has  unhap 
pily  descended.  And  even  with  regard  to  the  race  who  first 
introduced  it  we  shall  not  fulfil  the  duty  of  fellow-men,  if  we 
omit  to  consider  the  apologies  which  may  reasonably  be  sup 
posed  to  have  deluded  their  conscience  and  understanding, 
and  veiled  from  their  view  the  wickedness  they  committed  and 
the  misery  they  prepared.  The  negroes  first  brought  to  Vir- 

that  it  was  once  proposed  at  Rome  to  discriminate  the  slaves  by  a  peculiar 
dress ;  but  it  was  justly  apprehended  that  there  might  be  some  danger  in  ac 
quainting  them  with  their  own  numbers.  This  information  is  conveyed  to 
the  negroes  by  their  color ;  and  this  color  being  always  a  mark  of  contempt, 
even  those  negroes,  who  become  free  in  countries  where  their  race  is  general 
ly  enslaved,  continue  allied,  both  by  the  most  irritating  feelings,  and  by  the 
sympathy  they  must  entertain  for  men  of  the  same  complexion,  with  all  those 
who  remain  in  a  state  of  bondage. 

1  To  dream  of  freedom  in  his  slave's  embrace  —  is  represented  with  bitter 
satire  and  melancholy  truth  by  the  Irish  bard,  Moore,  as  the  felicity  of  many 
an  American  planter. 


152  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  I. 

ginia  were  enslaved  before  they  came  there,  and  by  the  pur 
chase  of  the  colonists  were  delivered  from  the  hold  of  a  slave- 
ship  and  the  peculiar  and  notorious  cruelty  of  the  Dutch. 
Some  little  good  might  thus  at  first  seem  to  result  from  the 
commission  of  evil.  When  the  slaves  were  few  in  number, 
and  consequently  incapable  of  awakening  public  jealousy  and 
alarm,  they  appear  to  have  been  kindly  treated  ; l  and  their 
masters  perhaps  intended  to  emancipate  them  at  that  con 
venient  season  for  adjusting  the  accounts  of  interest  and  con 
science,  which  every  added  year  and  every  addition  to  their 
numbers  tended  still  farther  to  postpone.  Even  at  a  later  pe 
riod  and  in  altered  circumstances,  numerous  instances  have 
been  known  of  what  is  most  inappropriately  termed  the  humane 
treatment  of  negro  slaves  by  masters,  who,  freely  dispensing 
physical  comforts  and  indulgences  to  them,  and  carefully  barring 
them  from  the  knowledge  that  would  waken  aspiration  for  a 
higher  moral  condition,  appeal  to  their  unmanly  contentment 
with  degradation  as  a  proof  that  slavery  may  be  a  happy  state.2 
Negro  slavery  lingered  long  in  the  settlements  of  the  Puri 
tans  in  New  England,  and  of  the  Quakers  in  New  Jersey  and 
Pennsylvania  ;  although  in  none  of  these  States  did  the  cli 
mate,  or  the  soil  and  its  appropriate  culture,  suggest  the  same 
temptations  to  this  inhumanity  which  presented  themselves  in 
the  southern  quarters  of  America.  Las  Casas,  so  distinguished 
by  the  warmth  of  his  philanthropy,  first  suggested  its  introduc 
tion  into  Mexico  and  Peru  ;  George  Fox,  the  most  intrepid 
and  enthusiastic  of  reformers,  demanded  no  more  of  his  fol 
lowers  than  a  mitigation  of  its  rigor  in  Barbadoes  ;  and  the 
illustrious  philosopher,  John  Locke,  renowned  also  as  the 
champion  of  religious  and  political  freedom,  introduced  an  ex 
press  sanction  of  it  into  the  Fundamental  Constitutions  of  Caro 
lina.  Georgia  is  the  only  one  of  the  North  American  States 
in  which  slavery  was  expressly  disallowed  by  the  fundamental 

1  The  treatment  of  slaves  at  Rome,  latterly  distinguished  by  the  most  enor 
mous  cruelty,  was  originally  kind  and  humane.     Plutarch,  Life  of  Coriolanus. 
In  the  reign  of  the  Emperor  Claudius,  it  was  found  necessary  to  pass  a  law 
forbidding  masters  to  kill  their  slaves  on  account  of  age  or  infirmity.     The 
original  admission  of  the  Hebrews  into  Egypt  was  an  act  of  benevolence ; 
and  it  was  only  when  they  had  waxed  numerically  strong  that  they  experi 
enced  the  rigors  of  bondage. 

2  One  of  the  best  pictures  I  have  ever  met  with  of  the  actual  operation  of 
negro  slavery  occurs  in  Pinckard's  Notes  on  the  West  Indies. 


CHAP.   III.]   CIVIL  AND  DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  VIRGINIA.    153 

laws  ;  but  these  laws  were  soon  repealed  ;  and  in  none  of  the 
other  States  has  slavery  proved  a  more  rigorous  and  oppres 
sive  yoke  than  in  Georgia.  Considerations  such  as  these  are 
calculated  to  increase  at  once  our  indulgence  for  mankind,  and 
our  abhorrence  of  that  insidious  and  formidable  mischief  which 
has  so  signally  baffled  the  penetration  of  the  wise,  and  tri 
umphed  over  the  benevolence  of  the  humane. 

The  other  cause  which  has  been  alluded  to,  as  operating  un 
favorably  on  the  prosperity  of  Virginia,  is  the  inordinate  cul 
tivation  of  tobacco.  As  long  as  Virginia  and  Maryland  were 
the  only  provinces  of  North  America  where  this  commodity 
was  produced,  their  inhabitants  devoted  themselves  almost  ex 
clusively  to  a  culture  which  is  attended  with  much  incon 
venience  to  the  persons  engaged  in  it,  and  no  small  disadvan 
tage  to  their  country  even  when  moderately  pursued.  It  re 
quires  extremely  fatiguing  labor  from  the  cultivators,  and  ex 
hausts  the  fertility  of  the  ground  ;  and,  as  little  food  of  any 
kind  is  raised  on  the  tobacco  plantations,  the  men  and  cattle  em 
ployed  on  them  are  badly  fed,  and  the  soil  is  progressively  im 
poverished.1  This  disadvantage  was  long  experienced  in  Vir 
ginia  ;  but  has  been  diminished  by  the  introduction  into  the 
markets  of  Europe  of  the  tobacco  produce  of  territories  more 
recently  subjected  to  cultivation.2 

1  Jefferson's  Notes  on  Virginia.        2  Priest's  Travels  in  America.    Warden. 


VOL.    I.  20 


IIOJIW  10 

oti  fil  bins 


Ol 


BOOK    II. 

FOUNDATION  AND  PROGRESS 

OF    THE 

NEW   ENGLAND   STATES, 

TILL  THE   YEAR 
1698. 


.11   2  0  0  Jl 


,<i/t  KYI 


3TAT3   O^/.JO^JT 


.11  *<>oan 


BOOK    II. 

THE   NEW  ENGLAND  STATES. 

*m?  Its  J-XKH!  : 

CHAPTER    I. 

Attempts  of  the  Plymouth  Company  to  colonize  the  northern  Coasts  of 
America.  —  Popham  establishes  a  Colony  at  Fort  Saint  George.  —  Suffer 
ings  and  Return  of  the  Colonists.  —  Captain  Smith's  Voyage  and  Survey  of 
the  Country  —  which  is  named  New  England.  —  His  ineffectual  Attempt  to 
conduct  a  Colony  thither.  —  The  Company  relinquish  the  Design  of  colo 
nizing  New  England.  —  History  and  Character  of  the  Puritans.  —  Rise  of 
the  Brownists  or  Independents.  —  A  Congregation  of  Independents  retire  to 
Holland  —  they  resolve  to  settle  in  America  —  their  Negotiation  with  King 
James  —  they  arrive  in  Massachusetts  —  and  found  New  Plymouth.  — 
Hardships  —  and  Virtue  of  the  Colonists.  —  Their  civil  Institutions.  —  Com 
munity  of  Property.  —  Increase  of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  Tyranny  in  Eng 
land.  —  Project  of  a  new  Colony  in  Massachusetts.  —  Salem  built.  —  Char 
ter  of  Massachusetts  Bay  obtained  from  Charles  the  First  by  an  Association 
of  Puritans.  —  Embarkation  of  the  Emigrants  —  Arrival  at  Salem. —  Their 
ecclesiastical  Institutions.  —  Two  Persons  banished  from  the  Colony  for 
Schism. —  Intolerance  of  some  of  the  Puritans. 

WHEN  James  the  First  of  England  gave  his  sanction  to  the 
project  of  colonizing  the  vast  district  of  North  America  which 
was  comprehended  at  that  time  [1606]  under  the  name  of  Vir 
ginia,  he  made  a  partition,  which  we  have  already  remarked, 
of  the  territory  between  two  trading  companies,  and  established 
the  residence  of  the  one  at  London,  and  of  the  other  at  Ply 
mouth.  If  the  object  of  this  partition  was  to  diminish  the 
inconvenience  of  monopoly,  and  diffuse  the  benefit  of  colonial 
relations  more  extensively  in  England,  the  means  were  ill 
adapted  to  the  end  ;  and  eventually  the  operation  of  this  act 
of  policy  was  far  from  corresponding  with  its  design.  The 
resources  of  the  adventurers,  who  had  already  prepared  to 
undertake  the  enterprise  of  colonization,  were  divided  so  un- 


158  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

equally,  and  yet  so  much  to  the  disadvantage  of  all  parties, 
that  even  the  more  powerful  company  was  barely  enabled  to 
maintain  a  feeble  and  precarious  settlement  in  Virginia  ;  while 
the  weaker,  without  ability  to  accomplish  the  purpose  of  its 
institution,  obtained  little  more  than  the  privilege  of  debarring 
the  rest  of  the  world  from  attempting  it.  We  have  seen  that 
the  southern  colony, — though  promoted  by  a  corporation  which 
reckoned  among  its  members  some  of  the  richest  and  most 
considerable  persons  in  the  realm,  and  enjoyed  the  advantage 
of  being  situated  in  a  town  then  engrossing  almost  all  the 
commercial  wealth  of  England,  —  even  with  the  aid  of  these 
favorable  circumstances,  made  but  slow  and  laborious  advances 
to  a  secure  establishment.  The  Plymouth  Company  possess 
ing  much  narrower  resources  and  a  less  advantageous  situation, 
its  efforts  were  proportionally  more  feeble  and  inadequate. 

The  most  conspicuous  members  of  the  Plymouth  Company 
were  Sir  John  Popham,  lord  chief  justice  of  England,  Sir 
Ferdinando  Gorges,  governor  of  Plymouth  Fort,  and  Sir  John 
Gilbert,  nephew  of  that  distinguished  adventurer  who  has 
already  engaged  our  notice  as  the  first  obtainer  of  a  patent  of 
colonization  from  Queen  Elizabeth,  and  the  earliest  conductor 
of  emigrants  to  America.  Animated  by  the  zeal  of  these  men, 
and  especially  of  Popham,  who  assumed  the  principal  direction 
of  their  measures,  the  Plymouth  Company,  shortly  after  their 
association,  despatched  a  small  vessel  to  inspect  their  terri 
tories  ;  but  soon  received  the  mortifying  intelligence  of  its 
capture  by  the  Spaniards,  who  still  pretended  right  to  exclude 
every  other  people  from  the  navigation  of  the  American  seas. 
The  chief  justice  and  his  friends,  however,  were  too  much 
bent  on  the  prosecution  of  their  purpose  to  be  deterred  by  this 
disaster.  At  his  own  expense,  Popham  equipped  and  de 
spatched  another  vessel  to  resume  the  survey  ;  and  having 
received  a  favorable  report  of  the  appearance  of  the  country, 
he  availed  himself  of  the  impression  produced  by  the  tidings  to 
raise  a  sufficient  supply  of  men  and  money  for  the  formation  of 
a  colony.  [May,  1607.]  Under  the  command  of  his  brother, 
Henry  Popham,  and  of  Raleigh  Gilbert,  brother  of  Sir  John, 
a  hundred  emigrants,  embarking  in  two  vessels,  repaired  to  the 
territory  of  what  was  still  called  Northern  Virginia  ;  and  took 


CHAP.  I.]    COLONY  AT  FORT  SAINT  GEORGE.        159 

possession  of  a  piece  of  ground  near  the  River  Sagadahoc, 
where  they  built  a  stronghold  and  named  it  Fort  Saint  George. 
The  district  where  they  established  themselves  was  rocky  and 
barren  ;  and  their  provisions  were  so  scanty,  that  they  were 
obliged,  soon  after  their  arrival,  to  send  back  to  England  all  but 
forty-five  of  their  number.  The  winter  proved  extremely  se 
vere,  and  confined  this  small  remnant  to  their  miserable  dwel 
ling,  and  a  helpless  contemplation  of  the  dreary  waste  that 
surrounded  it.  Disease,  the  offspring  of  scarcity  and  hardship, 
augmented  the  general  gloom  ;  and  before  the  return  of  spring, 
several  of  the  adventurers,  and  among  others  their  president, 
Henry  Popham,  had  sunk  into  the  grave.  With  the  spring 
[1608],  arrived  a  vessel  laden  with  supplies  from  England; 
but  the  intelligence  that  accompanied  these  supplies  more  than 
counterbalanced  the  satisfaction  they  afforded  ;  for  the  colo 
nists  were  now  informed  of  the  deaths  of  Chief  Justice  Popham 
and  Sir  John  Gilbert,  the  most  powerful  of  their  patrons  and 
most  active  of  their  benefactors.  Their  resolution  was  com 
pletely  subdued  by  so  many  misfortunes ;  and,  unanimously 
exclaiming  against  longer  continuance  in  those  dismal  scenes, 
they  forsook  the  settlement  and  returned  to  their  native  land, 
which  they  filled  with  the  most  disheartening  accounts  of  the 
soil  and  climate  of  Northern  Virginia.1  The  American  histo 
rians  have  been  careful  to  note  that  this  disastrous  expedition 
originated  with  the  judge,  who  (odious  and  despicable  in  every 
part  of  his  professional  career)  had,  three  years  before,  pre 
sided  with  the  most  scandalous  injustice  at  the  trial  of  Raleigh, 
and  condemned  to  the  death  of  a  traitor  the  man  to  whom 
both  England  and  America  were  so  greatly  beholden. 

The  miscarriage  of  this  colonial  experiment,  and  the  evil 
report  raised  against  the  scene  where  it  had  been  attempted, 
deterred  the  Plymouth  Company  for  some  time  from  any  far 
ther  exertion  to  plant  a  settlement  m  Northern  Virginia,  and 
produced  an  impression  on  the  minds  of  the  people  of  England 
very  unfavorable  to  emigration  to  that  territory.  For  several 
years,  the  operations  of  the  company  were  confined  to  a  few 

1  Smith's  History  of  Virginia,  New  England,  &c.  Stith's  History  of  Vir 
ginia.  Neal's  History  of  JVew  England  Hutchinson's  History  of  Massa 
chusetts. 


160  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

fishing  voyages  to  Cape  Cod,  and  a  traffic  in  peltry  and  oil 
with  the  natives.  At  length  their  prospects  were  cheered  by 
a  gleam  of  better  fortune  ;  and  the  introduction  of  Captain 
Smith  —  already  known  to  us  by  his  guardianship  of  the  infant 
province  of  Virginia  —  into  their  service,  seemed  to  betoken 
more  vigorous  and  successful  enterprise.  Sir  Ferdinando 
Gorges  and  some  other  leading  members  of  the  Plymouth 
Company,  justly  appreciating  the  genius  and  merit  of  this  man, 
were  fain  to  engage  his  valuable  services,  which  the  London 
Company  had  unworthily  neglected.  [1614.]  Six  years  after 
the  abandonment  of  the  settlement  at  Sagadahoc,  two  vessels 
were  despatched,  under  the  command  of  Captain  Smith  and 
Captain  Hunt,  on  a  voyage  of  trade  and  discovery  to  the  Ply 
mouth  Company's  territories.  Smith,  having  concluded  his 
traffic  with  the  natives,  left  his  crew  engaged  in  fishing,  and, 
accompanied  by  only  eight  men,  travelled  into  the  interior  of 
the  country,  surveyed  its  condition,  explored  with  care  and 
diligence  the  whole  coast  from  Cape  Cod  to  Penobscot,  and 
composed  a  map  in  which  its  features  were  accurately  delin 
eated.  On  his  return  to  England,  he  presented  his  map,  with 
an  account  of  his  travels  and  observations,  to  Prince  Charles, 
who  was  so  much  pleased  with  the  description  of  the  country, 
that  he  bestowed  on  it  the  name  of  New  England,  which  it  has 
ever  since  retained. 

The  successful  voyage  of  Captain  Smith,  and  the  favorable 
account  that  he  gave  of  the  territory,  though  they  contributed 
not  a  little  to  animate  the  spirit  of  commercial  adventure, 
could  not  overcome  the  general  reluctance  to  a  permanent  set 
tlement  in  this  region,  which  the  misfortunes  of  the  first  colo 
nists  had  created  in  England.  The  impediments  to  a  colonial 
establishment  in  this  quarter  of  America,  besides,  were  greatly 
increased  by  the  conduct  of  Hunt,  who  had  been  associated 
with  Smith  in  the  late  voyage.  That  sordid  and  profligate 
man,  unwilling  that  the  benefit  of  the  existing  narrow  traffic 
with  the  company's  territories,  which  was  exclusively  shared 
by  himself  and  a  few  others  who  were  aware  of  its  advantages, 
should  be  more  generally  diffused  by  the  formation  of  a  colony, 
resolved  to  defeat  the  design  by  embroiling  his  countrymen 
with  the  natives  ;  and  for  this  purpose,  having  enticed  a  num- 


CHAP.  I.]  FURTHER  ATTEMPTS  AT  COLONIZATION.    161 

ber  of  these  people  on  board  his  ship,  he  set  sail  with  them  for 
Malaga,  where  he  had  been  ordered  to  touch  on  his  homeward 
voyage,  and  sold  them  for  slaves  to  the  Spaniards.  The  com 
pany,  indignant  at  his  wickedness,  instantly  dismissed  him  from 
their  service  ;  but  his  mischievous  purpose  was  accomplished  ; 
and  the  next  vessel  that  returned  from  New  England  brought 
intelligence  of  the  vindictive  hostilities  of  the  savages.  Un 
dismayed  by  all  these  difficulties  and  dangers,  Smith  deter 
mined  to  make  an  effort  for  the  colonization  of  the  northern 
territory  ;  and  having  communicated  a  portion  of  his  own  reso 
lute  hope  and  spirit  to  some  of  the  leading  patentees,  he  was 
enabled,  by  their  assistance,  to  equip  a  small  squadron,  and 
set  sail  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  emigrants  for  New  England. 
[1615.]  Thus  far  could  energy  prevail  ;  but  in  a  struggle 
with  fate,  farther  advancement  was  impracticable  ;  and  Smith, 
who  had  now  accomplished  all  that  man  could  do,  was  des 
tined  to  experience  that  all  was  unavailing.  The  voyage  was 
one  uninterrupted  scene  of  disaster.  After  encountering  a  vio 
lent  tempest,  by  which  the  vessels  had  nearly  perished,  and  es 
caping  more  than  once  from  the  attacks  of  pirates,  Smith  was 
made  prisoner  by  the  commander  of  a  French  fleet,  who  mis 
took  or  pretended  to  mistake  him  for  Captain  Argal,  and 
charged  him  with  the  guilt  of  the  piratical  enterprise  which 
Argal  had  conducted  in  the  preceding  year  against  Port 
Royal.1  On  this  unjust  charge,  Smith  was  separated  from  his 
crew,  and  detained  long  in  captivity.  It  was  happy  for  him 
self  and  for  mankind  that  he  lived  to  return  to  his  country 
and  write  the  history  of  his  travels,  instead  of  reaching  New 
England,  where  his  blood  would  probably  have  stained  the  land 
which  his  genius  and  virtue  have  contributed  to  illustrate.  Sev 
eral  years  afterwards  [1619],  the  Plymouth  Company,  having 
discovered  that  an  Indian,  named  Squanto,  one  of  the  persons 
kidnapped  by  Hunt,  had  escaped  from  the  Spaniards  and  found 
his  way  to  Britain,  acquitted  themselves  to  his  satisfaction  of 
the  injury  he  had  suffered,  enriched  him  with  valuable  gifts, 
and  sent  him  back  to  New  England  along  with  a  small  expe 
dition  commanded  by  one  Dormer,  who  was  directed  to  avail 

1  Book  I.,  Chap.  II.,  ante. 
VOL.    I.  21 


162  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

himself  of  Squanto's  assistance  in  regaining  the  friendship  of 
the  Indians.  But  although  Squanto  earnestly  labored  to  pacify 
his  abused  countrymen,  and  assured  them  that  Hunt's  treach 
ery  had  been  condemned  and  punished  in  England,  they  would 
hearken  to  no  suggestion  that  forbade  the  gratification  of  their 
burning  revenge,  and,  watching  a  favorable  opportunity,  at 
tacked  and  dangerously  wounded  Dormer  and  several  of  his 
party,  who,  escaping  with  difficulty  from  the  hostile  region,  left 
Squanto  behind  to  urge  at  more  leisure  and  with  better  success 
his  topics  of  apology  and  conciliation.  Disgusted  by  so  many 
disappointments,  the  company  laid  aside  all  thoughts  of  estab 
lishing  colonies  in  New  England.  An  insignificant  traffic 
bounded  their  own  adventures  ;  and  they  exercised  no  farther 
dominion  over  the  territory  than  the  distribution  of  small  por 
tions  of  the  northern  quarter  of  it  to  private  adventurers,  who 
occupied  them  in  summer  as  mercantile  factories  or  victualling 
stations  for  the  use  of  vessels  resorting  thither  for  trade.1 

We  have  sufficient  assurance  that  the  course  of  this  world 
is  not  governed  by  chance  ;  and  that  the  series  of  events  which 
it  exhibits  is  regulated  by  divine  ordinance,  and  adapted  to 
purposes,  which,  from  their  transcendent  wisdom  and  infinite 
range,  often  elude  the  conceptive  grasp  of  created  capacity. 
As  it  could  not,  then,  be  without  high  design,  so  it  seems  to 
have  been  for  no  common  object,  that  discomfiture  was  thus 
entailed  on  the  counsels  of  princes,  the  schemes  of  the  wise, 
and  the  efforts  of  the  brave.  It  was  for  no  ordinary  people 
that  the  land  was  reserved,  and  of  no  common  qualities  or  vul 
gar  superiority  that  it  was  appointed  the  prize.  New  England 
was  the  destined  asylum  of  oppressed  piety  and  virtue  ;2  and  its 
colonization,  denied  to  the  pretensions  of  greatness  and  the 
efforts  of  might,  was  reserved  for  persons  whom  the  great  and 
mighty  despised  for  their  insignificance  and  persecuted  for 
their  integrity.  The  recent  growth  of  the  Virginian  colony, 
and  the  repeated  attempts  to  form  a  settlement  in  New  Eng 
land,  naturally  attracted  to  this  quarter  the  eyes  of  men  who 
felt  little  reluctance  to  abandon  a  country,  where,  for  con 
science's  sake,  they  had  already  incurred  the  loss  of  temporal 

1  Smith,     Neal,  ?  "  Jupiter  ilia  pise  secrevit  littora  genti."     Horace. 


CHAP.  I.]         THE  REFORMATION  IN  ENGLAND.  163 

ease  and  enjoyment  ;  whom  persecution  had  fortified  to  the" 
endurance  of  hardship,  and  piety  had  taught  to  despise  it.  It 
was  at  this  juncture  accordingly,  that  the  project  of  colonizing 
New  England  was  undertaken  by  the  Puritans  ;  a  class  of  men 
of  whose  origin,  sentiments,  and  previous  history  it  is  proper 
that  we  here  subjoin  some  account. 

Of  all  the  national  churches  of  Europe,  which,  at  the  era  of 
the  Reformation,  renounced  the  doctrine  and  revolted  from  the 
dominion  of  the  see  of  Rome,  there  was  none  in  which  the 
origin  of  the  separation  was  so  discreditable,  or  the  proceed 
ings  to  which  it  immediately  gave  rise  so  unreasonable  and  in 
equitable,  as  the  church  of  England.1  This  arose  partly  from 
the  circumstance  of  the  alteration  in  this  church  having  mainly 
originated  with  the  temporal  magistrate,  and  partly  from  the 
character  of  the  individuals  by  whom  the  interposition  of 
magisterial  authority  was  exerted.  In  the  Palatinate,  in  Bran 
denburg,  Holland,  Geneva,  and  Scotland,  where  the  reform 
proceeded  from  the  general  conviction,  the  doctrine  and  con 
stitution  of  the  national  church  corresponded  with  the  religious 
sentiments  of  the  people.  The  Biblical  Christianity  taught  by 
Calvin  and  Luther  (with  circumstantial  varieties,  occasioned  by 
variety  of  human  capacity,  sensibility,  and  attainment)  super 
seded  the  traditional  dogmas  of  the  church  of  Rome  ;  and  the 
primitive  simplicity  of  the  Presbyterian  administration  (with 
proportionate  varieties,  of  similar  origin)  superseded  the  pa 
geantry  of  her  ceremonial  and  the  pomp  of  her  constitution. 
In  England,  the  Reformation  originating  from  a  different  source, 
its  institutions  received  a  tincture  from  qualities  proportionally 
different.  The  same  haughty  and  imperious  disposition,  that 
prompted  Henry  the  Eighth  to  abolish  the  authority  of  the 
church  of  Rome  in  his  dominions,  regulated  all  his  views  and 
conduct  in  constructing  a  substitute  for  the  abrogated  system. 
Abetted  by  a  crew  of  servile  dependents  and  sordid  nobles, 
whom  he  enriched  with  the  spoils  of  the  plundered  monasteries, 

1  "  The  work,  which  had  been  begun  by  Henry,  the  murderer  of  his  wives, 
was  continued  by  Somerset,  the  murderer  of  his  brother,  and  completed  by 
Elizabeth,  the  murderer  of  her  guest.  Sprung  from  brutal  passion,  nurtured 
by  selfish  policy,  the  Reformation  in  England  displayed  little  of  what  had  in 
other  countries  distinguished  it,  unflinching  and  unsparing  devotion,  boldness 
of  speech,  and  singleness  of  eye."  —  Edinburgh  Review. 


164  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

-and  by  a  compliant  House  of  Commons,  whose  profession  of 
faith  veered  about  with  every  variation  of  the  royal  creed,  he 
neither  felt  nor  affected  the  slightest  respect  for  the  sentiments 
of  the  mass  of  the  people,  a  portion  of  his  subjects  to  whose 
petitions  he  once  answered,  by  a  public  proclamation,  that 
they  were  "  but  brutes  and  inexpert  folk,"  and  as  unfit  to  ad 
vise  him  as  blind  men  were  to  judge  of  colors.1  His  object 
was  to  substitute  himself  and  his  successors  as  heads  of  the 
church,  in  place  of  the  pope  ;  and  for  the  maintenance  of  this 
usurped  dominion,  he  retained,  both  in  the  ceremonies  of  wor 
ship  and  the  constitution  of  the  clerical  order,  a  great  deal  of 
the  machinery  which  his  predecessor  in  the  supremacy  had 
found  useful.  The  unbridled  vehemence  of  his  temper  de 
tracted  somewhat  from  the  policy  of  his  devices,  and  greatly 
disguised  their  aspect  as  a  politic  system  by  that  show  of  good 
faith  and  sincerity  which  accompanied  all  his  actions,  and 
which  was  but  the  natural  result  of  sincere  and  impetuous  self 
ishness,  and  of  a  presumptuous  and  undoubting  conviction  of 
the  superiority  of  his  own  understanding  and  the  infallibility  of 
its  dictates.2  While  he  rigidly  denied  the  right  of  private 
judgment  to  his  subjects,  his  own  incessant  and  imperious  ex 
ercise  of  this  right  continually  tempted  them  to  partake  the 
satisfaction  it  seemed  to  afford  him  ;  and  the  frequent  varia 
tions  of  the  creeds  he  promulgated  at  once  excited  a  spirit  of 
speculation  akin  to  his  own,  and  practically  refuted  the  only 
pretence  that  could  recommend  or  entitle  his  judgment  to  the 
implicit  assent  of  fallible  men.  The  pope,  expressly  maintain 
ing,  that  he,  in  virtue  of  his  sacred  office,  could  never  be  in  the 
wrong,  was  disabled  from  correcting  either  his  own  errors  or 
those  bequeathed  to  him  by  his  predecessors.  Henry,  merely 
pretending  to  the  privilege  of  being  always  in  the  right,  defeat 
ed  this  pretension  by  the  variety  and  inconsistency  of  the  sys 
tems  to  which  he  applied  it.  While  he  insisted  on  retaining 

1  Lord  Herbert's  Life  of  Henry  the  Eighth. 

*  The  public  disputation  which  he  held  with  one  of  his  subjects,  the  noble- 
minded  and  unfortunate  Lambert,  who  denied  the  doctrine  of  the  real  pres 
ence,  was,  perhaps,  regarded  at  the  time  as  an  act  of  admirable  zeal  and  most 
generous  condescension.  It  might  have  merited  this  praise,  if  the  horrid 
death  by  which  he  revenged  the  impotence  of  his  logic  did  not  prove  it  to 
have  been  an  overflowing  of  arrogance  and  vain-glory. 


CHAP.  I.]          THE  REFORMATION   IN  ENGLAND.  165 

much  of  the  peculiar  doctrine  of  the  church  of  Rome,  he  at 
tacked,  in  its  infallibility,  a  tenet  not  only  important  in  itself,  but 
the  sole  sanction  and  foundation  of  a  great  many  others.  Not 
withstanding  his  desire  to  restrain  it, — nay,  promoted,  indeed, 
by  some  part  of  his  own  conduct,  —  a  spirit  of  religious  inquiry 
began  to  arise  among  the  multitude  of  professors  who  blindly 
or  interestedly  had  followed  the  fortunes  and  the  fluctuations  of 
the  royal  creed  ;  and  the  knowledge  of  divine  truth,  combined 
with  a  growing  regard  for  simplicity  of  divine  worship,  arising 
first  in  the  higher  classes,  spread  downwards  through  the  suc 
cessive  grades  of  society  in  this  and  the  following  reigns.  The 
administration  of  inquisitorial  oaths,  and  the  infliction,  in  va 
rious  instances,  of  decapitation,  torture,  and  burning,  for  the 
crime  of  heresy,  during  Henry's  reign,  demonstrate  how  fully 
he  embraced  the  character  as  well  as  the  pretensions  of  the 
haughtiest  pontiffs  that  ever  filled  the  Romish  see,1  and  how 
ineffectually  he  labored  to  impose  his  own  heterogeneous  system 
of  opinions  on  the  understandings  of  his  subjects.  Even  in 
his  lifetime,  the  Protestant  doctrines  had  spread  far  beyond  the 
limits  of  any  of  the  peculiar  creeds  which  he  adopted  and 
promulgated  ;  and  in  their  illegitimate  extent  made  numerous 
proselytes  in  his  court  and  kingdom.  The  propagation  of 
them  was  aided  by  the  translation  and  diffusion  of  the  Scrip 
tures,  which  he  vainly  endeavoured  to  prevent,  and  which 
enabled  his  people  to  imbibe  religious  knowledge,  unstinted 
and  unadulterated,  from  its  everlasting  fountains.  The  open 
profession  of  those  illicit  opinions  was  in  many  instances  re 
pressed  by  the  terror  of  his  inflexible  cruelty,  and  by  the  in 
fluence  over  his  measures  which  his  lay  and  clerical  courtiers 
found  it  easy  to  obtain  by  feigning  implicit  submission  to  his 
capricious  and  impetuous  temper.2  The  temptations  which 
these  men  were  exposed  to  proved  fatal,  in  some  instances,  to 
their  integrity  ;  and  several  of  them  (even  the  vaunted  Cran- 
mer)  concurred,  though  reluctantly,  in  punishing  by  a  cruel 
death  the  public  avowal  of  sentiments  which  they  secretly 
cherished  in  their  own  breasts. 

By  the  death  of  Henry  the  Eighth  his  Protestant  subjects 

1  One  of  his  laws  (31  Henry  VIII.  Cap:  14)  bears  the  presumptuous  title 
of  "  An  act  for  abolishing  diversity  of  opinions  in  certain  articles  concerning 
the  Christian  religion." 

*  Lord  Herbert. 


166  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

were  released  from  the  necessity  of  farther  dissimulation.  In 
the  reign  of  his  son,  Edward  the  Sixth,  the  Catholic  doctrines 
were  wholly  expunged  from  the  national  creed,  and  the  funda 
mental  articles  of  the  Protestant  faith  recognized  and  estab 
lished  by  law.  As,  among  other  practices  of  the  preceding 
reign,  the  absurd  and  tyrannical  device  of  promoting  uniformity 
of  faith  and  worship  by  persecution  was  still  pursued,1  the  in 
fluence  of  temporal  fear  and  favor  contributed,  no  doubt,  to 
encumber  the  Protestant  church  with  many  reluctant  and  hypo 
critical  professors.  In  the  hope  of  reconciling  the  English 
nation  as  extensively  as  possible  to  the  system  which  they  es 
tablished,  the  ministers  of  Edward  preserved  not  only  the  ec 
clesiastical  constitution  which  Henry  had  retained,  but  as  much 
of  the  ancient  ceremonial  of  worship  as  they  judged  likely  to 
gratify  the  taste  and  predilections  of  minds  that  still  hankered 
after  Catholic  pageantry.  They  rather  complied  in  this  respect 
with  the  prevalent  temper  and  disposition  of  the  people,  than 
indulged  their  own  sentiments  or  followed  out  their  principles  ; 
and  plainly  insinuated  their  opinion,  that,  whenever  the  public 
mind  was  sufficiently  prepared  for  it,  a  farther  reformation 
should  be  introduced  into  the  establishment,  by  inserting  a 
prayer  to  this  purpose  in  the  liturgy.2  But,  in  the  exercise 
of  their  temporizing  policy,  the  rulers  of  the  English  reformed 
church  encountered  a  spirit  of  resistance,  originating  in  the 
Protestant  body  itself.  During  the  late  reign,  the  disaffection 
that  had  been  cherished  in  secret  towards  the  national  church 
was  not  confined  to  the  doctrines  savoring  of  Popery,  which 
she  retained,  and  which  many  Protestants  connected  in  their 
opinion  and  esteem  with  the  ceremonial  rites  and  clerical  habits 
that  had  for  ages  been  their  inveterate  associate  and  distinctive 
livery.  With  their  enmity  to  the  doctrines  of  the  Romish 
church,  they  combined  an  aversion  to  those  ceremonies  which 
her  ministers  had  too  often  rendered  subservient  to  imposture  ; 
which  seemed  to  owe  their  survivance  in  the  national  system 
to  the  same  cloud  of  error  and  superstition  that  had  long  shel 
tered  so  much  doctrinal  heresy  ;  and  which  diverted  the  mind 
from  that  spiritual  worship  expressly  claimed  for  the  Most  High 
in  the  Scriptures  of  truth. 

1  2  &  3  Edward  VI.  Chap.  I.    Burnet's  History  of  the  Reformation.    Rymer. 

2  Neal. 


CHAP.  I.]  RISE  OF  PURITANISM.  167 

These  sentiments,  which  were  subsequently  developed  and 
ripened  into  the  doctrines  of  the  Puritans,  had  already  taken 
possession  of  the  minds  of  some  of  the  English  Protestants  ; 
but  their  operation  was  yet  comparatively  feeble  and  partial. 
One  of  the  most  remarkable  manifestations  of  their  influence 
that   have  been   transmitted  to   us   was    afforded   by  Bishop 
Hooper,  who,  in  the  reign  of  Edward,  refused  to  be  conse 
crated  to  his  office  in  the  superstitious  habits  (as  he  deemed 
them)  appropriated  by  the  church  to  the  episcopal  order.     The 
Protestant  opinions  of  this  prelate  had  rendered  him  an  exile 
rom  England  during  the  latter  part  of  the  preceding  reign,  and 
his  Puritan  sentiments  were  confirmed  by  the  conversation  of 
the  Presbyterian  teachers  with  whom  he  associated  during  his 
residence  abroad.     Cranmer  and  Ridley,  who  were  afterwards 
his  fellow-sufferers   under  the   persecution   of  Mary,  resorted 
to  arguments,  threats,  entreaties,  and  imprisonment,  In   order 
to    overcome   Hooper's    objections  ;  and  it  was  not   without 
great  difficulty  and  reluctance  that  his  rigid  spirit  condescend 
ed   to  terminate  the  dispute  by  a  compromise.1     The  senti 
ments,  which  had  thus  received  the  sanction  of  a  man  distin 
guished  no  less  by  the  purity  and  elevation  of  his  character 
than  by  the  eminence  of  his  station  in  the  church,  continued  to 
manifest  themselves  throughout  the  short  reign  of  Edward  ;  and 
there  was  scarcely  a  rite  of  the  established  worship,   or  an 
article  of  ecclesiastical  apparel,  that  escaped  impugnation  and 
contentious  discussion.2     The  defenders  of  the    controverted 
practices  (or  at  least  the  more  enlightened  of  this  party)  did 
not  pretend  that  they  were  of  divine  appointment,  or  in  them 
selves   of  essential   importance.     They  maintained    that  they 
were  in  themselves  inoffensive,  and   that  by  long  establishment 
and    inveterate  association   they  had  taken  possession  of  the 
reverence  of  the  people,  and  contributed  to  attach  their  affec 
tions  to  the  national  worship.     They  admitted,  that,  as  useless 
and  exotical  appendages,  it  was  desirable  that  time  and  reason 
should  gradually  obliterate  such  practices  ;  but  insisted  that  it 
would  be  both  unwise  and  illiberal  to  abolish  them  abruptly, 
and  at  the  risk  of  unhinging   the    important   sentiments    with 

1  Burnet.     Heylin's  History  of  the  Reformation.  2  Strype. 


168  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

which  they  had  accidentally  connected  themselves.  This  rea 
soning  was  very  unsatisfactory  to  the  Puritans,  who  rejected 
such  temporizing  policy  as  the  counsel  of  lukewarm  piety  and 
worldly  wisdom,  and  regarded  with  abhorrence  the  mixture  of 
superstitious  attractions  with  the  motives  to  that  which  should 
be  entirely  a  reasonable  service  ; 1  and  whatever  weight  the 
arguments  of  the  prevailing  party  may  be  considered  to  pos 
sess,  they  certainly  cannot  justify  the  violent  imposition  of  ob 
servances,  which  their  own  patrons  regarded  as  indifferent,  on 
persons  who  deemed  them  sinful  and  pernicious.  The  senti 
ments  of  the  Puritans,  whether  supported  or  not  by  superior 
force  of  reason,  were  overborne  by  the  force  of  superior  num 
bers,  and  might  perhaps  have  gradually  died  away,  if  the  reign 
of  Edward  had  been  farther  prolonged,  or  his  sceptre  been 
transmitted  to  a  Protestant  successor.  But  the  reign  of  Mary 
was  destined  at  once  to  purify  the  Protestant  body  by  sep 
arating  the  true  and  sound  members  from  the  false  or  formal 
professors,  and  to  radicate  every  Protestant  sentiment  by  ex 
posing  it  to  the  fiery  test  of  tyrannical  rage  and  persecution. 

The  administration  of  this  queen  was  productive  of  events 
that  tended  to  enliven  and  extend  the  Puritan  sentiments,  and 
at  the  same  time  to  animate  the  opposition  of  some  of  their  ad 
versaries.  During  the  heat  of  her  bloody  persecution,  many 
of  the  English  Protestants  forsook  their  country,  and  sought 
refuge  in  the  Protestant  states  of  Germany  and  Switzerland. 
There,  in  regulating  for  themselves  the  forms  and  ordinances 
of  divine  worship,  their  ancient  disputes  naturally  recurred, 
and  were  exasperated  by  the  approach  of  the  two  parties  to  an 
equality  of  numbers  that  never  before  subsisted  between  them, 
and  protracted  by  the  utter  want  of  a  spirit  of  mutual  compli 
ance,  and  the  absence  of  any  tribunal  from  which  an  authorita 
tive  decision  could  be  obtained.  The  Puritans  beheld  with 
pleasure  in  the  continental  churches  the  establishment  of  a  con 
stitution  and  ritual  which  had  been  the  object  of  their  own 
warm  approbation  and  earnest  desire  ;  and  they  either  com 
posed  for  themselves  a  formula  of  religious  association  on  a 
similar  model,  or  entered  into  communion  with  the  churches 

1  Strype. 


CHAP.  I.]    THE  PURITAN  AND  HIGH-CHURCH  PARTIES.     169 

established  in  the  places  where  they  resided.  Their  oppo 
nents,  on  the  other  hand,  clung  more  firmly  than  ever  to  their 
ancient  practices  ;  refused  to  surrender  any  one  of  the  institu 
tions  of  the  faith,  for  the  sake  of  which  they  had  forsaken 
their  country  ;  and  plumed  themselves  on  reproducing,  amidst 
the  desolation  of  their  church  at  home,  an  entire  and  accurate 
model  of  her  ordinances  in  the  scene  of  their  exile.  Both 
parties  were  willing  to  have  united  in  church-fellowship  with 
each  other,  if  either  could  have  yielded  in  the  dispute  concern 
ing  forms  of  office,  habits,  and  ceremonies.  But  though  each 
considered  itself  strongest  in  faith,  neither  felt  disposed  on  that 
account  to  succumb  to  what  it  deemed  the  infirmities  of  the 
other  ;  and  though  united  in  the  great  fundamental  points  of 
Christian  belief,  and  associated  by  the  common  calamity  that 
rendered  them  fellow-exiles  in  a  foreign  land,  their  fruitless  con 
troversies  separated  them  more  widely  than  they  had  ever  been 
before,  and  inflamed  them  with  mutual  dislike  and  animosity.1 
On  the  death  of  Mary,  both  parties  returned  to  England  ;  the  one 
joyfully  expecting  to  see  their  ancient  style  of  worship  re 
stored  ;  the  other  more  firmly  wedded  to  their  Puritan  senti 
ments  by  the  opportunity  they  had  obtained  of  freely  indulging 
them,  and  entertaining  (in  common  with  many  who  had  re 
mained  at  home)  an  increased  antipathy  to  the  habits  and  cer 
emonies  which  the  recent  ascendency  and  measures  of  Catho 
lic  bigots  forcibly  associated  with  the  odious  features  of  super 
stitious  delusion  and  tyrannic  cruelty. 

The  views,  of  which  the  Puritans  expected  the  accomplish 
ment  from  the  accession  of  Elizabeth  to  the  throne,  were 
seconded  by  the  disposition  of  not  a  few  even  of  their  oppo 
nents  among  the  leading  Protestant  churchmen  who  had  weath 
ered  the  storm  at  home.  Several  of  the  most  distinguished 
persons  of  this  class  expressed  the  strongest  reluctance,  in  re 
storing  the  Protestant  constitution,  to  interweave  with  its  fun 
damental  canons  any  subordinate  or  merely  ceremonial  regula 
tions  that  might  be  offensive  to  men  endeared  to  them  by  their 
common  calamity,  and  so  recently  associated  with  them  as 
confessors  not  merely  for  the  forms  but  for  the  very  substance 

1  Neal. 

VOL.  i.  22 


170  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

of  the  Christian  religion.  Some  of  the  Puritans,  no  doubt, 
were  stiffly  bent  on  reducing  the  model  of  the  church  to  a 
strict  conformity  with  their  own  peculiar  sentiments  and  stand 
ard  of  propriety  ;  and  some  of  their  opponents  were  as  stout 
ly  resolved  to  prohibit  and  suppress  every  trace  of  Puritan 
practice.1  The  majority,  however,  as  well  as  the  leading 
members  of  both  parties,  were  sincerely  desirous  to  promote 
an  accommodation  on  the  principle  of  mutual  forbearance  ;  and 
willingly  agreed  that  the  disputed  habits  and  ceremonies  should 
be  retained  in  the  church  as  observances  merely  of  a  discre 
tionary  and  indifferent  nature,  not  to  be  controverted  by  the 
one  party  nor  enforced  by  the  other,  but  left  to  be  confirmed 
or  abolished,  extended  or  qualified,  by  the  silent  progress  of 
sentiment  and  opinion.2  But  these  wise  and  candid  conces 
sions  were  frustrated  by  the  views  and  temper  of  the  queen  ; 
whose  authority  soon  defaced  the  fair  prospect  that  had  arisen 
of  concord  and  happiness,  and  involved  the  people  committed 
to  her  care  in  a  long  and  widening  scene  of  strife,  malevolence, 
and  misery. 

Elizabeth  inherited  the  headstrong  and  arrogant  disposition 
of  her  father,  and  his  taste  for  splendid  pageantry.  And  though 
she  was  educated  with  her  brother  Edward,  and  her  under 
standing  had  received  a  strong  tincture  of  Protestant  opinion, 
her  sentiments  inclined  her,  with  manifest  bias,  in  favor  of  the 
rites,  discipline,  and  even  doctrine  of  the  Catholics  ;  of  every 
thing,  in  short,  that  could  lend  an  imposing  aspect  to  the  ec 
clesiastical  establishment  of  which  she  was  the  supreme  head, 
and  extend  the  dominion  which  she  was  resolved  to  maintain 
over  the  clergy.  She  publicly  thanked  one  of  her  chaplains 
for  preaching  in  defence  of  the  Real  Presence,  and  rebuked 
another  for  mentioning  with  little  reverence  the  Catholic  notion 
of  an  inherent  virtue  in  the  symbol  of  the  cross.3  She  desired 
to  make  the  clergy  priests,  and  not  preachers  ;  discouraged 
their  sermons  ;  and  would  have  interdicted  them  from  mar 
riage,  had  she  not  been  restrained  by  the  remonstrances  of  her 
minister,  Lord  Burleigh.4  Disregarding  the  wishes  and  en 
treaties  both  of  Churchmen  and  Puritans,  she  restored  King 

Neal.        *  Strype's  Life  of  Parker.     Neal.        3  Heylin.        4  Strype. 


CHAP.  I.]  THE  ACT  OF  UNIFORMITY.  171 

Edward's  constitutions,  with  no  other  alteration  than  the  omis 
sion  of  a  few  passages  in  the  liturgy  which  were  offensive  to 
the  Catholics  ;  and  caused  a  law  to  be  framed,  commanding, 
under  the  penalties  of  fine,  imprisonment,  and  deprivation  of 
ministerial  office,  a  strict  uniformity  of  religious  worship.1 
This  was  the  first  step  in  a  line  of  policy  which  the  church  of 
England  has  had  deep  and  lasting  cause  to  deplore,  and  which, 
by  compelling  thousands  of  her  best  and  ablest  ministers  re 
luctantly  to  forsake  her  communion,  afflicted  her  with  a  decay 
of  internal  piety,  of  which  the  traces  continued  to  be  visible 
after  the  lapse  of  many  generations. 

But  this  law  was  for  some  time  neither  strictly  nor  generally 
executed.  The  queen  could  not  at  once  find  a  sufficient  num 
ber  of  persons  fitted  to  sustain  the  dignity  of  episcopal  eleva 
tion,  and  yet  willing  to  become  the  instruments  of  her  arbitrary 
designs  ;  nor  could  all  her  efforts  for  a  while  excite  general 
strife  and  ill-will  among  men,  of  whom  so  many,  though  dif 
fering  from  each  other  on  subordinate  points,  had  but  lately 
been  united  by  community  of  sentiment  and  suffering  in  the 
noblest  cause  that  can  interest  human  hearts.  Her  first  bench 
of  bishops  were  not  only  eager  to  clear  themselves  of  the  re 
proach  of  having  composed  or  approved  the  existing  laws,2 
but,  by  a  general  forbearance  to  exact  compliance  with  them, 
enabled  the  Puritan  ministers  and  the  practices  of  Puritanism 
to  obtain  a  considerable  footing  in  the  church.  And  though 
she  reprimanded  the  primate,  Parker,  for  his  negligence,  and  at 
length  stimulated  him  to  the  exertion  of  some  rigor  in  the  exe 
cution  of  the  Act  of  Uniformity,  it  was  far  from  obtaining  gen 
eral  prevalence  ;  and  by  various  acts  of  connivance  on  the  one 
side,  and  prudent  reserve  or  simulated  compliance  on  the  other, 
the  Puritans  were  enabled  to  enjoy  the  semblance  of  toleration. 
Their  tranquillity  was  promoted  by  the  accession  of  Grindall 
to  the  primacy.  The  liberal  principles  and  humane  disposition 
of  this  man  revolted  against  the  tyrannical  injustice  which  he 
was  required  to  administer  ;  and  at  the  expense  of  his  own 

1  Neal. 

2  In  their  letters  to  their  friends  at  home  and  abroad,  they  not  only  reprobate 
the  obnoxious  institutions,  but  promise  to  withstand  them  "  till  they  be  sent 
back  to  hell,  from  whence  they  came  to  sow  discord,  confusion,  and  vain  for 
mality  in  the  church."     Burnet.     Neal. 


172  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

temporal  liberty  and  dignity  (for  the  queen  disgraced  and  im 
prisoned  him) ,  he  prolonged  the  duration  of  lenient  policy  and 
the  peace  of  the  church.1 

At  length,  on  the  death  of  Grindall,  the  primacy  was  be 
stowed  on  Whitgift,  a  man  of  severe  temper,  a  rigid  votary  of 
the  established  system  of  ecclesiastical  discipline  and  policy, 
and  an  implacable  adversary  of  the  Puritans,  against  whom  he 
had  repeatedly  directed  the  hostility  of  his  pen,  and  now  gladly 
wielded  a  more  formidable  weapon.  From  this  period,  all  the 
force  of  the  law  was  spent  in  uninterrupted  efforts  to  harass 
the  persons  or  violate  the  consciences  of  the  Puritans.  A  great 
number  of  Puritan  ministers  were  deprived  of  their  benefices  ; 
and  many  of  their  parishioners  were  punished  by  fine  and  im 
prisonment  for  attending  their  ministry  in  the  fields  and  woods, 
where  they  continued  to  exercise  it.  Vainly  were  the  exer 
tions  of  wise  and  good  men  employed  to  move  the  queen,  ere 
yet  it  was  too  late,  to  recede  from  her  fatal  policy,  and  stifle 
the  flame  of  discord  which  she  was  essaying  to  kindle  among 
her  people.  Burleigh  and  Walsingham  earnestly  interceded 
for  the  suspended  ministers  ;  urging  the  indulgence  due  to  their 
conscientious  scruples,  the  humane  concern  to  which  their 
families  were  entitled,  and  the  respect  which  sound  policy 
demanded  for  the  sentiments  of  that  numerous  portion  of  the 
people  by  whom  they  were  revered  and  beloved.  The  House 
of  Commons,  too,  showed  a  desire  to  procure  some  relief  for 
the  oppressed  Puritans.  But  Whitgift  flung  himself  on  his 
knees  before  the  queen,  and  implored  her  to  uphold  the  sinking 
church,  and  to  admit  no  alteration  of  its  ritual  that  would  au 
thorize  men  to  say  that  she  had  maintained  an  error.2  His 
humiliation,  most  probably,  was  prompted  rather  by  flattery 
than  fear  ;  for  Elizabeth  had  shown  no  inclination  whatever  to 
mitigate  an  imperious  policy  so  congenial  to  her  own  character. 

The  exaction  of  implicit  deference  to  her  judgment,  and  of 
rigid  conformity  to  the  ecclesiastical  model  she  had  preferred, 

1  Strype's  Life  of  Grindall.     Neal. 

2  Walton,  a  great  admirer  of  this  prelate,  thus  characterizes  his  policy  with 
the  queen.     "  By  justifiable  sacred  insinuations,  such  as  St.  Paul  to  Agrippa, 
'  Agrippa,  believest  thou  ?     I  know  that  thou  believest,'  he  wrought  himself 
into  so  great  a  degree  of  favor  with  her,  as,  by  his  pious  use  of  it,  hath  got 
both  of  them  a  great  degree  of  fame  in  this  world  and  of  glory  in  that  into 
which  they  are  now  both  entered."  —  Life  of  Hooker. 


CHAP.  I.]      MEASURES  FOR  ENFORCING  UNIFORMITY.        173 

was  the  result  of  her  early  and  stubborn  choice,  and  pursued 
with  her  usual  firmness  and  vigor  of  determination.  She  over 
bore  all  opposition  ;  and  the  primate  and  his  associates  being 
encouraged  to  proceed  in  the  course  which  they  had  com 
menced,  their  zeal,  enlarging  as  it  flowed,  soon  transported 
them  beyond  all  bounds  of  decency  and  humanity.  They 
were  empowered  to  establish  a  court  of  commissioners  for  the 
detection  of  non-conformity,  which  even  the  privy  council  com 
plained  of  as  a  copy  of  the  detested  tribunal  of  the  Inquisition. 
By  the  assistance  of  this  tyrannical  engine,  they  gave  freer 
course  to  the  severities  of  the  law  ;  and  having  rendered  integ 
rity  hazardous,  they  made  prudence  unavailing  to  the  Puritans. 
In  vain  were  they  reminded  of  the  maxim  of  the  earliest  Chris 
tian  council,  which  recommended  the  imposition  of  no  greater 
burden  on  the  people  than  the  observation  of  duties  undeniably 
necessary  and  of  primary  importance.  For  the  purpose  of 
imposing  a  load  of  ceremonies,  which  they  could  not  pretend 
to  characterize  as  essential  requisites  to  salvation,  they  com 
mitted  such  oppression  as  rendered  the  ceremonies  themselves 
tenfold  more  obnoxious  to  those  persons  to  whom  even  in 
dulgent  treatment  would  have  failed  to  recommend  them  ;  and 
roused  the  opposition  of  others,  who  would  willingly  have 
complied  with  the  ceremonial  ordinances,  if  they  had  been 
proposed  to  them  merely  as  matters  of  convenient  observance, 
but  revolted  from  them,  as  fraught  with  danger  and  mischief, 
when  it  was  attempted  to  bind  them  on  the  conscience,  and 
place  them  on  a  level  with  the  most  sacred  obligations. 

The  chief  fruits  of  this  increased  severity  were  the  enkin 
dling  of  much  additional  zeal  and  fervor  in  the  minds  of  the 
Puritans,  the  multiplication  of  their  numbers  by  the  powerful 
influence  of  sympathy  with  their  courage  and  compassion  for 
their  sufferings,  and  a  growing  abhorrence  among  them  of  the 
order  of  bishops  and  the  whole  frame  of  a  church  which  to 
them  was  an  organ  of  injustice  and  tyranny.  It  is  certain  that 
all  or  almost  all  the  Puritans  of  those  times  were  at  first  averse 
to  separate  from  the  church  of  England  ;  and  their  ministers 
were  still  more  reluctant  to  abet  a  schism  and  renounce  their 
preferments.  They  willingly  recognized  in  her  the  character 
of  a  true  Christian  church,  and  merely  claimed  for  themselves 


174  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

indulgence  with  regard  to  a  few  ceremonies  which  did  not  affect 
the  substance  of  her  constitution.  But  the  injurious  treatment 
which  they  received  held  forth  a  premium  to  very  different 
considerations,  and  at  once  aroused  their  passions,  stimulated 
their  inquiries,  and  extended  their  arguments  and  objections. 
Expelled  from  fellowship  with  the  national  church,  they  were 
forcibly  invited  to  inquire  if  they  could  not  dispense  with  that 
which  they  found  they  could  not  obtain  ;  and  were  easily  led 
to  question  if  the  genuine  features  of  a  Christian  church  could 
be  recognized  in  that  society  which  not  only  rejected  but  per 
secuted  them  for  conscientious  adherence,  in  a  matter  of  cere 
monial  observance,  to  what  they  believed  to  be  the  manifest 
will  of  God.  As  the  Puritan  principles  spread  through  the 
mass  of  society,  and  encountered  in  their  progress  a  greater 
variety  of  character  in  their  votaries  and  of  treatment  from  their 
adversaries,  considerable  varieties  and  inequalities  of  sentiment 
and  conduct  appeared  in  different  portions  of  the  Puritan  body. 
Some  of  them  caught  the  spirit  of  their  oppressors,  and,  in 
words  at  least,  retaliated  the  unchristian  usage  they  underwent. 
They  combined  the  doctrines  of  the  New  with  the  practices  of 
the  Old  Testament,  in  a  manner  which  will  not  excite  the  won 
der  of  those  who  recollect  that  some  of  the  very  earliest  vota 
ries  of  Christianity  in  the  world  committed  the  same  error,  and 
so  far  forgot  the  meekness  they  had  been  commanded  to  evince, 
as  even  in  the  presence  of  their  Divine  Master  to  propose  the 
invocation  of  fire  from  heaven  on  the  men  who  rejected  their 
society.  But  the  instances  of  this  spirit  were  at  first  exceed 
ingly  rare  ;  and  it  was  not  till  the  following  reigns  that  it  pre 
vailed  either  strongly  or  widely.  In  general,  the  oppressed 
Puritans  conducted  themselves  with  the  fortitude  of  heroes  and 
the  patience  of  saints  ;  and,  what  is  surprising,  they  made  more 
zealous  and  successful  efforts  to  preserve  their  loyalty  than  the 
queen  and  the  bishops  did  to  extinguish  it.  Many,  in  defiance 
of  every  danger,  followed  the  preaching  of  their  favorite  minis 
ters  into  the  highways  and  fields,  or  assembled  privately  in  con 
venticles,  which  the  general  sympathy,  or  the  connivance  of 
their  secret  partisans  among  the  adherents  of  the  ecclesiastical 
establishment,  sometimes  preserved  from  detection.  Others 
reluctantly  tarried  within  the  pale  of  the  national  church,  un- 


CHAP.  I.]    ABJECT  HOMAGE  PAID  QUEEN  ELIZABETH.      175 

weariedly  pursuing  their  ineffectual  attempts  to  promote  parlia 
mentary  interference  in  behalf  of  the  Puritan  cause,  and  casting 
a  wistful  eye  on  the  presumptive  succession  of  a  prince  who 
was  educated  in  a  Presbyterian  society.  Some,  at  length,  open 
ly  disclaimed  the  national  system,  and  were  led  by  the  cruel 
excesses  of  magisterial  power  to  the  conviction,  that  magisterial 
power  ought  to  be  banished  entirely  from  the  administration  of 
the  kingdom  of  Christ.1 

The  designs  of  the  queen  were  cordially  abetted  by  the 
angry  zeal  of  those  Churchmen  who  had  fled  from  England  in 
the  preceding  reign,  and  taken  part  in  the  controversy  that 
arose  with  the  Puritans  during  their  common  exile.     But  the 
whole  civil  and  ecclesiastical  policy  of  the  present  reign  was 
mainly  and  essentially  the  offspring  of  Elizabeth's  own  charac 
ter  and  disposition.     The  Puritan  writers,  bestowing  an  undue 
proportion  of  their  resentment  on  those  persons  whose  functions 
rendered  them  the  instruments  as  well  as  the  apologists  of  the 
queen's  ecclesiastical  system,   have  been  disposed  to  impute 
the  tyrannical  features  of  this  system  exclusively  to  the  bishops, 
and  particularly  to  Whitgift,  whose  influence  with  Elizabeth 
they   ascribe  to  his  constant  habit  of  addressing  her  on  his 
knees.2    But  Whitgift,  in  seconding  her  enmity  to  the  Puritans, 
did  no  more  than  subminister  to  her  favorite  and  declared  pur 
pose  ;  with  zeal  half  courtly,  half  clerical,  he  flattered  a  temper 
which  she  had  already  unequivocally  manifested,  and  swam  with 
the  stream  of  that  resolute  determination,  which,  he  saw,  would 
have  its  way.     The  abject  homage  which  he  paid  her  was 
nothing  more  than  she  was  accustomed  generally  to  receive  ; 
and  the  observation  which  it  has  attracted  from  the  Puritans 
denotes  rather  a  peculiarity  in  their  own  sentiments  and  man 
ners,  than  any  thing  remarkable  in  the  conduct  of  their  ecclesi 
astical  adversary.     Not  one  of  her  subjects  was  permitted  to 
address  the  queen  without  kneeling  ;  wherever  she  turned  her 
eye,  every  one  was  expected  to  fall  on  his  knees  ;  and  even  in 
her  absence,  the  nobles,  who  were  alone  deemed  worthy  to 
cover  her  table,  made  three  genuflections  every  time  they  ap 
proached  or  retired  from  it  in  the  performance  of  their  menial 

1  Strype's  Life  of  Whitgift.    Fuller's  Church  History.    Neal.        *  Neal. 


176  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

duty.1  This  was  an  exact  counterpart  of  the  homage  rendered 
by  the  Catholics  to  the  Real  Presence,  which  they  believed  to 
reside  in  the  Host ;  and  the  sentiments  which  it  tended  to  im 
plant,  both  in  the  prince  who  received  and  the  subjects  who 
proffered  it,  were  confirmed  by  the  language  of  parliament,  in 
which  the  queen  was  continually  flattered  with  attributes  and 
praise  befitting  the  homage  of  creatures  to  their  Creator.  Nor 
was  this  servile  system  of  manners  peculiar  to  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth.  On  the  contrary,  it  was  carried  even  to  a  greater 
extent  under  the  government  of  her  predecessors  ;  and  her 
ministers  frequently  noted  and  deplored  the  decay  of  that 
fearfulness  and  reverence  of  their  superiors  which  had  formerly 
characterized  the  inferior  estates  of  the  realm.2  Sense  and 
reason  shared  the  ignominy  and  degradation  of  manners  ;  arro 
gance  disordered  the  understanding  of  the  prince,  while  servility 
deformed  the  sentiments  of  the  people  ;  and  if  Henry  the 
Eighth,  by  a  royal  proclamation,  assured  the  populace  that 
they  were  brutes,  —  the  same  populace,  in  their  petitions 
against  his  measures,  represented  the  promotion  of  low-born 
persons  to  public  trust  and  honor  as  one  of  the  most  serious 
and  intolerable  grievances  of  which  they  had  reason  to  com 
plain.3 

The  sentiments  which  such  practices  and  manners  tended  to 
create  or  nourish  in  the  mind  of  the  queen  enhanced  the  dis 
pleasure  with  which  she  regarded  the  Puritans,  who  were  fated 
to  offend  her  by  their  political  conduct,  as  well  as  their  relig 
ious  opinions.  Many  persons  of  note  among  them  obtained 
seats  in  parliament,  where  they  studied  to  cherish  and  in 
vigorate  a  spirit  of  liberty,  and  direct  its  energy  to  the  protec 
tion  of  their  persecuted  brethren.  Impelled,  by  the  severity  of 
the  restraints  they  experienced,  to  investigate  the  boundaries  of 
that  authority  by  which  such  restraints  were  imposed,  —  and 
regulating  their  sentiments  rather  by  the  consequences  they 
foresaw  than  by  the  precedents  they  remembered,  —  they 
questioned  the  rational  legitimacy  of  the  most  inveterate  prac- 

1  Hentzner's  Journey  into  England  in  1598.  Much  of  this  abject  ceremonial 
was  abolished  by  King  James,  who,  though  highly  relishing  adulation,  found 
himself  embarrassed  by  a  mode  of  displaying  it  so  ill  suited  to  his  awkward 
manners  and  ungainly  appearance. 

3  Hayne's  Collection  of  State  Papers.  3  Lord  Herbert. 


CHAP.  I.]    LIBERAL  PRINCIPLES  OF  THE  PURITANS.        177 

tices,  and  obtained  the  confidence  of  the  people  by  showing 
themselves  the  indefatigable  and  fearless  defenders  of  all  \vho 
were  oppressed.  In  the  annals  of  those  times,  we  find  them 
continually  supporting  petitions  in  parliament  against  monopo 
lies,  and  advocating  propositions  for  reformation  of  ecclesi 
astical  abuses  and  corruptions.  Attracting  popular  favor,  and 
willing  to  undergo  the  labor  of  parliamentary  service,  they 
gradually  multiplied  their  numbers  in  the  House  of  Commons, 
and  acquired  an  ascendant  over  its  deliberations.  The  queen, 
observing  that  the  Puritans  were  the  sole  abettors  of  measures 
calculated  to  restrict  her  prerogative,  was  easily  led  to  ascribe 
the  peculiarity  of  their  religious  and  political  opinions  to  the 
same  source,  —  a  malignant  aversion  to  exalted  rank,  and 
mutinous  impatience  of  subordination.  Their  reluctance  to 
render  to  the  Deity  that  ceremonious  homage  which  she  her 
self  received  from  the  most  illustrious  persons  in  the  land, 
and  their  inclination  to  curtail  the  royal  authority,  which  from 
no  other  quarter  experienced  resistance,  seemed  to  her  the 
manifest  proofs  of  an  insolent  disregard  no  less  of  the  Supreme 
Being  than  of  her,  his  acknowledged  vicegerent  and  repre 
sentative,  —  a  presumptuous  insurrection  of  spirit  against  the 
reverence  due  to  God  and  the  loyalty  due  to  the  prince.1 

Nothing  could  be  more  unjust  and  fallacious  than  this  royal 
reasoning.  The  religion  as  well  as  the  loyalty  of  the  Puri 
tans  was  the  less  ceremonious,  only  because  it  was  the  more 
reflective,  profound,  and  substantial.  *To  preserve  an  un 
stained  conscience,  they  encountered  the  extremities  of  eccle 
siastical  rigor.  Notwithstanding  the  most  oppressive  and  tyran 
nical  treatment,  they  exhibited  a  resolute  constancy  of  regard 
to  their  sovereign.  And  neither  intimidated  by  danger  nor 

1  In  a  speech  from  the  throne,  she  informed  the  Commons  (after  a  candid 
confession  that  she  knew  nobody  who  had  read  or  reflected  as  much  as  her 
self),  that  whoever  attacked  the  constitutions  of  the  church  slandered  her  as 
its  supreme  head,  divinely  appointed ;  and  that,  if  the  Papists  were  inveterate 
enemies  to  her  person,  the  modern  sectaries  were  no  less  formidable  to  all 
regal  government.  She  added,  that  she  was  determined  to  suppress  their 
overboldness  in  presumptuously  scanning  the  will  of  God  Almighty.  D'Ewes's 
Account  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  Parliaments.  The  cruel  law  that  was  passed  in 
the  thirty-fifth  year  of  the  queen's  reign,  against  all  ecclesiastical  recusants,  is 
entitled  "  An  Act  to  retain  her  Majesty's  Subjects  in  their  due  Obedience,"  and 
was  intended,  as  the  preamble  declares,  to  repress  the  evil  practices  of"  secta 
ries  and  disloyal  persons,"  —  synonymous  descriptions  of  guilt,  in  the  estima 
tion  of  Elizabeth. 

VOL.  i.  23 


178  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

dispirited  by  defeat,  they  maintained  a  continual  effort  to  check 
the  excesses  of  despotic  authority,  and  to  rear  and  sustain  the 
infant  liberties  of  their  country.  They  have  incurred  the  re 
proach  of  gloomy  and  unseasonable  melancholy  from  those  who 
rendered  their  lives  at  once  bitter  and  precarious  ;  of  a  neglect 
of  general  literature,  and  an  exclusive  study  of  the  Bible,  from 
those  who  destroyed  their  writings,  subjected  the  press  to 
episcopal  licensers,  and  deprived  them  of  every  source  of  com 
fort  and  direction  but  what  the  Bible  could  supply  ;  of  an  ex 
aggerated  estimate  of  little  matters,  from  those  who  rendered 
such  matters  the  occasion  of  cruel  suffering  and  enormous 
wrong  to  them  ;  of  a  stern  jealousy  of  civil  power,  from  those 
who  made  it  continually  their  interest  to  question  and  abridge 
the  authority  by  which  they  were  oppressed.  A  great  philoso 
pher  and  historian,  who  will  not  be  suspected  of  any  undue 
partiality  for  Puritan  tenets,  whether  religious  or  political,  has 
been  constrained  to  acknowledge  that  the  Puritans  were  the 
preservers  of  civil  and  religious  liberty  in  England.1  It  was  a 
scion  of  the  same  stock  that  was  destined  to  propagate  these 
blessings  in  America. 

The  minds  of  a  numerous  party  among  the  Puritans  had  been 
gradually  prepared  to  disclaim  the  authority  of  the  national 
church,  and  to  deny  the  lawfulness  of  holding  communion  with 
it  ;  insomuch,  that,  when  these  sentiments  were  first  publicly 
proclaimed  by  Robert  Brown,  in  1586,  they  readily  gained 
the  assent  and  open  profession  of  multitudes.  Brown,  who 
obtained  the  distinction  of  bestowing  his  name  on  a  sect  which 
derived  very  little  credit  from  the  appellation,  was  a  young 
clergyman  of  good  family,  endowed  with  a  restless,  intrepid 

1  "  So  absolute,  indeed,  was  the  authority  of  the  crown,  that  the  precious 
spark  of  liberty  had  been  kindled  and  was  preserved  by  the  Puritans  alone  ; 
and  it  was  to  this  sect,  whose  principles  appear  so  frivolous  and  habits  so 
ridiculous,  that  the  English  owe  the  whole  freedom  of  their  constitution." 
Hume's  England.  Again,  "  It  was  only  during  the  next  generation  that  the 
noble  principles  of  liberty  took  root,  and,  spreading  themselves  under  the  shel 
ter  of  Puritanical  absurdities,  became  fashionable  among  the  people."  Ibid. 

In  a  well  known  passage,  Hume  has  represented  the  domestic  leisure  and 
social  converse  of  the  Puritan  leaders  as  polluted  by  a  barbarous  sullenness, 
vulgarity,  and  fanaticism  ;  most  unjustly,  as  every  one  must  have  felt,  who,  in 
reading  the  Memoirs  of  Colonel  Hutchinson,  has  paused  over  the  delightful 
picture  they  present  of  ease  and  leisure  devoted  to  elegant  studies,  virtuous 
pursuits,  useful  occupations,  polite  amusements,  rational  converse,  and  cheer 
ful  hospitality. 


CHAP.  I.]  RISE  OF  THE   BROWNISTS.  179 

• 

disposition,  a  fiery  temper,  and  an  insatiable  thirst  for  contro 
versy.  Encountering  the  wrath  of  ecclesiastics  with  still  fiercer 
wrath,  and  trampling  on  their  arrogance  with  more  than  clerical 
pride,  he  roamed  about  the  country,  inveighing  against  bishops, 
ecclesiastical  courts,  religious  ceremonies,  and  episcopal  ordi 
nation  of  ministers,  and  exulting,  above  all,  in  the  boast  that  he 
had  been  committed  to  thirty-two  prisons,  in  some  of  which  he 
could  not  discern  his  hand  at  noonday.  His  impetuous  and 
illiberal  spirit  accelerated  the  publication  of  opinions  which 
were  not  yet  matured  in  the  Puritan  body,  and  which,  but  for 
his  unseasonable  interposition  and  perverting  influence,  might 
sooner  have  been  ripened  into  the  system  of  the  Independents. 
The  queen  and  the  bishops  applied  the  usual  remedy  of  perse 
cution  to  this  innovation,  with  even  more  than  the  usual  evi 
dence  of  the  unfitness  of  such  instrumentality  to  accomplish 
their  purpose.  Supported  by  strong  argument,  maintained 
with  striking  zeal  and  courage,  and  opposed  by  cruelties  that 
disgraced  the  name  of  religion,  the  principles  of  the  Brownists 
spread  widely  through  the  land.  Brown  himself,  and  a  con 
gregation  more  immediately  attached  to  him,  expatriated  to 
Middelburg,  in  Zeeland,  where  they  were  permitted  to  ex 
press  and  cultivate  their  opinions  without  molestation.  But 
Brown  had  collected  around  him  spirits  too  congenial  to  his 
own  to  preserve  their  union  when  the  iron  band  of  oppression 
was  withdrawn.  The  congregation  crumbled  into  parties,  and 
was  soon  dissolved  ;  and  Brown,  returning  to  England,  re 
joined  the  national  church,  and,  contracting  dissolute  habits, 
ended  his  days  in  indolence  and  contempt.  But  the  doctrines 
which  he  had  been  the  means  of  introducing  to  public  notice 
had  firmly  rooted  themselves  in  the  Puritan  body,  and  received 
daily  accessions  to  the  numbers  and  respectability  of  their 


votaries. 


The  Brownists  did  not  dissent  from  the  church  of  England 
in  any  of  her  articles  of  faith,  but  they  accounted  her  ritual  and 
discipline  unscriptural  and  superstitious,  and  all  her  sacraments 
and  ordinances  invalid  ;  and  they  renounced  communion  not 
only  with  her,  but  with  every  other  Protestant  church  that  was 


1  Fuller.    Neal. 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

• 

not  constructed  on  the  same  model  as  their  own.  Their  eccle 
siastical  model  was  derived  from  the  closest  imitation  of  the 
apostolical  institutions  as  delineated  in  Scripture.  When  a 
church  or  congregation  was  to  be  formed,  all  the  persons  who 
desired  to  be  members  of  it  professed  the  particulars  of  their 
religious  faith  in  each  other's  presence,  and  signed  a  covenant 
by  which  they  obliged  themselves  to  make  the  Bible  and  its 
ordinances  the  sole  guide  of  their  conduct.  Each  congregation 
formed  an  independent  church,  and  the  admission  or  exclusion 
of  members  resided  with  the  brethren  composing  it.  Their 
ecclesiastical  officers  were  elected  from  among  themselves,  and 
invested  with  their  several  charges  of  preaching  the  gospel, 
administering  the  sacramental  ordinances,  and  relieving  the 
poor,  —  after  fasting  and  prayer,  by  the  imposition  of  the  hands 
of  certain  of  the  brethren.  They  did  not  account  the  priest 
hood  a  distinct  order,  nor  the  ministerial  character  indelible  ; 
but  deemed,  that,  as  the  appointment  of  the  church  conferred  on 
a  minister  his  function  (which  in  its  exercise,  too,  was  limited 
to  the  special  body  to  which  he  was  attached),  so  the  same 
authority  was  sufficient  to  deprive  him  of  it.  It  was  permitted 
to  any  one  of  the  brethren  to  exercise  the  liberty  of  prophesying, 
which  meant  the  addressing  of  occasional  exhortation  to  the 
people  ;  and  it  was  usual  for  some  of  them,  after  the  customary 
religious  service,  to  promulgate  questions  and  considerations 
relative  to  the  doctrines  that  had  been  preached.1  The  con 
dition  to  which  the  Puritans  were  reduced  by  their  oppressors 
favored  the  prevalence  of  all  that  was  separative  and  unsocial 
in  the  principles  of  the  Brownist  teachers  ;  for,  as  they  could 
assemble  only  by  stealth,  it  was  impossible  to  preserve  a  regu 
lar  intercourse  between  their  churches,  or  to  ascertain  how  far 
they  mutually  agreed  in  doctrine  and  discipline. 

Against  these  men,  in  whose  characters  were  united  more 
piety,  virtue,  courage,  and  loyalty  than  any  other  portion  of 
her  people  displayed,  did  Elizabeth  and  her  ecclesiastical  coun 
sellors  direct  the  whole  fury  of  the  law.  John  Udall,  one  of 
their  ministers,  was  tried  in  the  year  1591,  for  having  published 
a  defence  of  their  tenets,  which  he  entitled,  A  Demonstration 

1  Neal. 


CHAP.  I.]  PERSECUTION  OF  THE  PURITANS.  181 

of  the  Discipline  which  Christ  hath  prescribed  in  his  Word  for 
the  Government  of  the  Church  in  all  Times  and  Places  until 
the  World's  End.  This  performance,  consistently  with  Eliza 
beth's  maxim,  that  whoever  attacked  the  established  church 
slandered  the  queen,  was  regarded  as  a  political  libel,  and 
Udall  was  arraigned  on  a  charge  of  capital  felony.  In  con 
formity  with  the  barbarous  jurisprudence  which  then  prevailed 
in  England,  the  witnesses  against  the  prisoner  were  not  con 
fronted  with  him  ;  his  proposition  to  adduce  exculpatory  evi 
dence  was  disallowed,  as  an  affront  to  the  majesty  of  the  crown  ; 
and  because  he  refused  at  the  bar  to  swear  that  he  was  not  the 
author  of  the  book,  his  refusal  was  urged  against  him  as  the 
strongest  proof  of  his  guilt.  When  he  was  told  by  one  of  the 
judges  that  a  book  replete  with  sentiments  so  inconsistent  with 
the  established  institutions  tended  to  the  overthrow  of  the  state 
by  the  provocation  of  rebellion,  he  replied,  "  My  Lords,  that  be 
far  from  me  ;  for  we  teach,  that,  reforming  things  amiss,  if  the 
prince  will  not  consent,  the  weapons  that  subjects  are  to  fight 
withal,  are  repentance  and  prayers,  patience  and  tears."  The 
judge  offered  him  his  life,  if  he  would  recant  ;  and  added,  that 
he  was  now  ready  to  pronounce  sentence  of  death.  "  And  I 
am  ready  to  receive  it,"  exclaimed  this  magnanimous  man  ; 
"for  I  protest  before  God  (not  knowing  that  I  have  to  live  an 
hour)  that  the  cause  is  good  ;  and  I  am  contented  to  receive 
sentence,  so  that  I  may  leave  it  to  posterity  how  I  have  suf 
fered  for  the  cause."  l  He  was  condemned  to  die  ;  and  being 
still  urged  to  submit  to  the  queen,  he  readily  expressed  his 
regret  that  any  of  his  writings  had  given  her  offence,  and  dis 
claimed  any  such  wish  or  intention,  but  firmly  refused  to  disown 
what  he  believed  to  be  truth,  or  to  renounce  liberty  of  con 
science.  By  the  interest  of  some  powerful  friends,  a  con 
ditional  pardon  was  obtained  for  him  ;  but  before  the  terms  of 
it  could  be  adjusted,  or  the  queen  prevailed  on  to  sign  it,  he 
died  in  prison. 

1  Howell's  State  Trials.  It  is  remarkable,  that,  although  one  devoted  victim 
of  royal  vengeance  and  persecution  (Sir  Nicholas  Throgmorton)  was  enabled 
to  escape  during  the  reign  of  Mary,  not  one  of  the  objects  of  Elizabeth's  hos 
tility  was  equally  fortunate.  A  great  addition  to  the  power,  as  well  as  the 
pretensions,  of  the  first  Protestant  sovereigns  of  England  was  derived  from 
their  assumption  of  the  ecclesiastical  supremacy  previously  ascribed  to  the 
Roman  pontiff. 


182  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Penry,  Greenwood,  Barrow,  and  Dennis,  of  whom  the  first 
two  were  clergymen,  and  the  others  laymen,  were  soon  after 
tried  on  similar  charges,  and  perished  by  the  hands  of  the  ex 
ecutioner.  A  pardon  was  offered  to  them,  if  they  would  retract 
their  profession  ;  but,  inspired  by  a  courage  which  no  earthly 
motive  could  overcome,  they  clung  to  their  principles,  and  left 
the  care  of  their  lives  to  Heaven.  Some  more  were  hanged  for 
dispersing  the  writings,  and  several  for  attending  the  discourses, 
of  the  Brownists.  Many  others  endured  the  torture  of  severe 
imprisonment,  and  numerous  families  were  reduced  to  indi 
gence  by  heavy  fines.1  Who  could  doubt  the  final  triumph  of 
a  cause  that  already  produced  so  noble  an  army  of  heroes  and 
martyrs  ?  As  the  most  virtuous  and  honorable  are  ever,  on 
such  occasions,  most  exposed  to  danger,  every  stroke  of  the 
oppressor's  arm  is  aimed  at  those  very  qualities  in  his  adver 
saries  that  constitute  his  own  defence  and  security  ;  and  hence, 
severities,  so  odious  to  mankind,  and  so  calculated  to  unite  by 
a  strong  sympathy  the  minds  of  the  spectators  and  the  suffer 
ers,  are  more  likely  to  diminish  the  virtue  than  the  numbers  of 
a  party.  By  dint  of  long  continuance  and  of  the  exertion  of 
their  influence  on  a  greater  variety  of  human  character,  they 
finally  divested  a  great  many  of  the  Puritans  of  the  spirit  of 
meekness  and  non-resistance  for  which  the  fathers  of  the  party 
had  been  so  highly  distinguished.  But  this  fruit  was  not  gath 
ered  till  a  subsequent  reign  ;  and  the  first  effect  of  the  sys 
tem  of  rigor  was  not  only  to  multiply  the  numbers,  but  to  con 
firm  the  virtue  of  the  Puritans.  When  persecution  had  as  yet 
but  invigorated  their  fortitude  without  inspiring  ferocity,  a  por 
tion  of  this  people  was  happily  conducted  to  the  retreat  of 
America,  there  to  plant  and  extend  the  principles  of  their 
cause,  —  while  their  brethren  in  England  remained  behind  to 
revenge  its  accumulated  wrongs. 

When  the  queen  was  informed,  by  Dr.  Reynolds,  of  the 
firm  and  elevated,  yet  mild  and  gentle,  piety  which  the  martyrs 
of  her  cruelty  had  displayed,  —  how  they  blessed  their  perse 
cuting  sovereign,  and  turned  the  scaffolds  to  which  she  con 
signed  them  into  scenes  of  holy  charity,  whence  they  prayed 

1  Strype's  Life  of  JVhitgift.     Fuller.     Neal. 


CHAP.  I.]          PERSECUTION  OF   THE  PURITANS.  183 

for  her  long  and  happy  reign,  —  her  heart  was  touched  with  a 
sentiment  of  remorse,  and  she  expressed  regret  for  having 
taken  their  lives  away.  But  repentance  with  all  mankind  is 
too  often  but  a  fruitless  anguish  ;  and  princes  have  been  known 
to  bewail,  even  with  tears,  the  mortal  condition  of  multitudes 
whom  they  were  conducting  to  slaughter,  and  the  brevity  of 
that  life  which  their  own  selfish  and  sanguinary  ambition  was 
contributing  still  farther  to  abridge.  Elizabeth,  so  far  from  al 
leviating,  increased,  the  legislative  severities  whose  effects  she 
had  deplored  ;  and  was  fated  never  to  see  her  errors,  till  it 
was  too  late  to  repair  them.  In  the  year  1593,  a  few  months 
after  the  executions  which  we  have  remarked,  a  new  and  se 
verer  law  was  enacted  against  the  Puritans.  These  sectaries 
were  not  only  increasing  their  numbers  every  day,  but  furnish 
ing  so  many  votaries  of  the  Brownist  or  Independent  doctrines, 
that,  in  the  debate  which  took  place  in  the  House  of  Com 
mons  on  the  introduction  of  this  measure,  Sir  Walter  Raleigh 
stated  that  the  number  of  professed  Brownists  alone  then 
amounted  to  twenty  thousand.  The  humane  argument,  how 
ever,  which  he  derived  from  this  consideration,  was  unavailing 
to  prevent  the  enactment  of  a  law,1  which  ordained,  that  any 
person  above  sixteen  years  of  age,  who  obstinately  refused, 
during  the  space  of  a  month,  to  attend  public  worship  in  a  le 
gitimate  parochial  church,  should  be  committed  to  prison  ;  that, 
if  he  persisted  three  months  in  his  refusal,  he  must  abjure  the 
realm  ;  and  that,  if  he  either  refused  this  condition,  or  returned 
after  banishment,  he  should  suffer  death  as  a  felon.  If  this 
act  was  not  more  fortunate  than  its  predecessors  in  accomplish 
ing  the  main  object  of  checking  the  growth  of  Puritan  prin 
ciples,  it  promoted  at  least  the  subordinate  purpose  of  driving 
a  great  many  of  the  professors  of  ecclesiastical  independency 
out  of  England. 

A  numerous  society  of  these  fugitives  was  collected,  about 
the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century,  at  Amsterdam,  where  they 
flourished  in  peace  and  piety  for  upwards  of  a  hundred  years. 

1  35  Eliz.  Cap.  1.  Raleigh  was  not  the  only  favorite  of  Elizabeth  who  was 
opposed  to  her  ecclesiastical  policy.  One  of  the  causes  of  her  displeasure  at 
Lord  Essex  was  the  countenance  he  gave  to  the  Puritans,  who  had  previously 
received  still  more  active  patronage  from  her  haughty  minion,  Lord  Leicester. 
—  Walton's  Life  of  Hooker. 


184  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Others  retired  to  various  Protestant  states  on  the  continent, 
whence,  with  fond,  delusive  hope,  they  looked  to  be  recalled  to 
their  native  land  on  the  accession  of  Elizabeth's  successor. 
The  remainder  continued  in  England,  to  fluctuate  between  the 
evasion  and  the  violation  of  the  law,  —  cherishing  along  with 
their  principles  a  stern  impatience,  generated  by  the  galling 
restraint  that  impeded  the  free  expression  of  them  ;  and  yet 
retained  in  submission  by  the  hope,  which,  in  common  with  the 
exiles,  they  indulged,  of  a  mitigation  of  their  sufferings  on  the 
demise  of  the  queen.1  Some  historians  have  expressed  sur 
prise  at  the  close  concurrence  of  that  general  and  impatient 
desire  of  a  new  reign,  which  was  manifested  in  the  conclusion 
of  Elizabeth's  life,2  with  the  strong  and  sudden  disgust  which 
the  government  of  her  successor  experienced  ;  and  hence  have 
taken  occasion,  with  censorious  but  inapplicable  wisdom,  to 
deplore  the  ingratitude  and  fickleness  of  mankind.  But  the 
seeming  inconsistency  admits  of  an  explanation  more  honorable 
to  human  nature,  though  less  creditable  to  royal  wisdom  and 
virtue.  Elizabeth  had  exhausted  the  patience  and  loyalty  of  a 
great  portion  of  her  subjects  ;  and  the  adherence  to  her  policy, 
which  her  successor  unexpectedly  manifested,  disappointed  all 
the  hopes  by  which  those  virtues  had  been  sustained. 

The  hopes  of  the  Puritans  were  derived  from  the  education 
of  the  Scottish  king,  and  supported  by  many  of  his  declara 
tions,  which  were  eagerly  cited  and  circulated  in  England. 
James  (pupil  of  the  great  George  Buchanan,  who  succeeded 
no  farther  than  in  rendering  the  object  of  his  tuition,  what  Sul 
ly  termed  him,  the  wisest  fool  in  Europe)  was  bred  a  Presby 
terian  ;  he  had  publicly  declared  that  the  church  of  Scotland 
was  the  best  ecclesiastical  constitution  in  the  world,  and  that 
the  English  liturgy  resembled,  to  his  apprehension,  an  ill- 
chanted  mass.  On  his  accession  to  the  English  crown,  he 
was  solicited  by  numerous  petitions  to  interpose  his  authority 
for  the  protection  and  relief  of  the  Puritans  ;  and  at  first  he 
showed  himself  so  far  disposed  to  comply  with  their  wishes  as 
to  appoint  a  solemn  conference  between  their  leaders  and  the 
heads  of  the  Church  party  at  Hampton  Court.  But  the  hopes 

1  Strype's  Life  of  Whitgift.    D'Ewes.     Neal. 

*  "  Four  days  after  her  death,  she  was  forgotten."  —  Carte's  England. 


CHAP.  I.]    POLICY  AND  RELIGIOUS  VIEWS  OF  JAMES  I.     1 85 

inspired  by  the  proposition  of  this  conference  were  disappoint 
ed  by  its  result.  [Jan.  1604.]  If  James  ever  sincerely  pre 
ferred  a  Presbyterian  to  an  Episcopal  establishment,  his  opin 
ion  was  entirely  reversed  by  the  opportunity  he  now  enjoyed 
of  comparing  them  with  each  other,  and  by  the  very  different 
treatment  he  experienced  from  their  respective  ministers. 

In  Scotland  he  had  been  engaged  in  perpetual  contentions 
with  the  clergy,  who  did  not  recognize  in  his  kingly  office  any 
supremacy  over  their  church,  and  who  differed  from  him  ex 
ceedingly  in  their  estimate  of  his  piety,  capacity,  and  attain 
ments.  Precluded  by  his  poverty  from  a  display  of  regal 
pomp,  that  might  have  dazzled  their  eyes,  and  hid  the  weakness 
of  the  man  behind  the  grandeur  of  the  monarch,  he  stood  plain 
ly  revealed  to  their  keen  glance,  an  awkward  personification  of 
conceit  and  pedantry,  obstinate  but  unsteady,  filled  with  the 
rubbish  and  subtilty  of  scholastic  learning,  void  of  manly  sense 
and  useful  knowledge.  They  have  been  accused,  and  not 
without  reason,  of  disturbing  his  government  by  exercising  a 
censorial  power  over  it ;  but  it  was  he  himself  that  first  taught, 
or  at  least  encouraged,  them  thus  to  overstep  their  functions. 
Extending  his  administration  into  their  peculiar  province,  where 
it  had  no  right  to  penetrate,  he  seemed  to  sanction  as  well  as 
provoke  their  retributive  strictures  on  his  intrusion.  Mingling 
religious  notions  with  his  political  views,  he  attempted  to  re 
model  the  church  ;  and  the  clergy,  mingling  political  doctrines 
with  their  theological  sentiments,  complained  of  his  interfer 
ence,  and  censured  the  whole  strain  of  his  government.  In  an 
appeal  to  the  public  opinion  and  will,  they  easily  triumphed 
over  the  unpopular  pretensions  of  their  feeble  sovereign,  and 
gained  a  victory  which  they  used  with  little  moderation,  and 
which  he  resented  not  less  as  a  theological  than  as  a  political 
affront.  One  of  the  ministers  of  the  church  of  Scotland  had 
so  far  transgressed  the  limits  of  decency  and  propriety  as  to 
declare  publicly  that  "  all  kings  are  the  Devil's  children  "  ; l 
and  James  retorted  the  discourtesy,  when  he  found  himself  safe 
from  their  spleen  and  turbulence  in  England,  by  warmly  pro 
testing  that  "  a  Scottish  presbytery  agrees  as  well  with  mon- 

1  Spottiswoode. 
VOL.  i.  24 


186  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

archy  as  God  and  the  Devil."  l  The  sentiments  that  naturally 
resulted  from  offended  arrogance  and  mortified  presumption 
were  expanded  to  their  amplest  plenitude  by  the  blaze  of  flat 
tery  and  adulation  with  which  the  dignitaries  of  the  English 
church  greeted  their  new  sovereign.  By  them  he  was  readily 
hailed  the  supreme  head  of  their  establishment,  the  protector 
of  its  privileges,  the  centre  of  its  splendor,  the  fountain  of  its 
dignities  ;  and  Whitgift  did  not  scruple  to  declare,  in  the  con 
ference  at  Hampton  Court,  that  undoubtedly  his  Majesty  spake 
by  the  special  assistance  of  God's  spirit.2 

This  was  the  last  impulse  that  the  deluded  ecclesiastic  was 
destined  to  impart  to  royal  pride  and  folly.  Confounded  at 
the  wide  and  spreading  explosion  of  Puritan  sentiment,  which 
he  had  flattered  himself  with  the  hope  of  having  almost  entirely 
extinguished,  his  grief  and  concern  so  violently  affected  his  aged 
frame  as  to  cause  his  death  very  shortly  after.  [Feb.  1604.] 
But  he  had  already  contributed  to  instil  the  ecclesiastical  spirit 
of  Elizabeth  into  the  mind  of  her  successor  ;  and  James,  inflam 
ed  with  admiration  of  a  church,  which,  like  a  faithful  mirror  (he 
thought),  so  justly  reflected  and  illustrated  his  royal  perfec 
tions,  became  henceforward  the  determined  patron  of  the 
church  of  England,  and  the  persecutor  of  all  who  opposed  her 
institutions.  He  was  the  first  prince  who  assumed  the  title  of 
Sacred  Majesty,  which  the  loyalty  of  bishops  transferred  from 
their  God  to  their  king.  His  natural  conceit,  fortified  by  the 
testimony  of  the  English  prelates,  soared  to  a  height  of  sur 
passing  arrogance  and  presumption  ;  and  he,  who,  in  Scotland, 
had  found  himself  curbed  in  every  attempt  to  interfere  with  the 
religious  institutions  of  his  own  narrow  realm,  now  reckoned 
himself  qualified  and  entitled  to  dictate  the  ecclesiastical  policy 
of  foreign  nations. 

Engaging  in  a  dispute  with  Vorstius,  professor  of  theology 
in  a  Dutch  university,  and  finding  his  adversary  insensible  to 
the  weight  of  his  arguments,  he  resolved  to  make  him  feel  at 
least  the  weight  and  the  stretch  of  his  power  ;  and,  roused  on 
this  occasion  to  a  degree  of  energy  and  haughtiness  to  which 
no  other  foreign  concernment  was  ever  able  to  excite  him,  he 

1  Fuller.  z  Rennet. 


CHAP.  I.]   PERSECUTION  OF  THE  PURITANS  BY  JAMES.     1 87 

remonstrated  so  strenuously  with  the  States  of  Holland,  that,  to 
silence  his  clamor,  they  stooped  to  the  mean  injustice  of  de 
posing  and  banishing  the  professor.  With  this  sacrifice  to  his 
insulted  logic  James  was  forced  to  be  contented,  though  he 
had  endeavoured  to  inspire  his  allies  with  the  purpose  of  more 
sanguinary  vindication,  by  acquainting  them,  "  that,  as  to  the 
burning  of  Vorstius  for  his  blasphemies  and  atheism,  he  left 
them  to  their  own  Christian  wisdom,  —  though,  surely,  never 
heretic  better  deserved  the  flames."  He  did  not  fail  to  rein 
force  this  charitable  counsel  by  his  own  example  ;  and  in  the 
course  of  his  reign  burned  at  the  stake  two  persons  who  enter 
tained  the  Arian  system  of  doctrine,1  and  an  unfortunate  luna 
tic  who  mistook  himself  for  the  Deity,  and  whose  frenzy  was 
thus  cruelly  treated  by  a  much  more  dangerous  and  deliberate 
invader" of  divine  attributes. 

If  James  had  not  been  restrained  by  the  growing  political 
ascendency  of  the  Puritans,  there  would  probably  have  been 
more  of  such  executions  in  England.  He  did,  however,  as 
much  as  he  dared  ;  and  finding  in  Bancroft  a  fit  successor  to 
Whitgift,  he  made,  with  his  assistance,  so  vigorous  a  commence 
ment,  that  in  the  second  year  of  his  reign  three  hundred  Puri 
tan  ministers  were  deprived  of  their  benefices,  and  either  im 
prisoned  or  banished.  To  preclude  the  communication  of 
light  from  abroad,  the  importation  of  any  books  hostile  to  the 
restraints  imposed  by  the  laws  of  the  realm  or  the  king's  proc 
lamations  was  forbidden  under  the  severest  penalties  ;  to  pre 
vent  its  rise  and  repress  its  spread  at  home,  no  books  were 
suffered  to  be  printed  in  England  without  the  license  of  a  com 
mittee  of  bishops  or  their  deputies  ;  and  arbitrary  jurisdictions 
for  the  trial  of  ecclesiastical  offences  were  multiplied  and  ex 
tended.  Persons  suspected  of  entertaining  Puritan  sentiments, 
even  though  they  adhered  to  the  established  ecclesiastical  sys 
tem,  were  subjected  to  fine  and  imprisonment  for  barely  re 
peating  to  their  families,  in  the  evening,  the  substance  of  the 
discourses  they  had  heard  at  church  during  the  day,  —  under 
the  pretence,  that  this  constituted  the  crime  of  irregular  preach- 

1  One  of  these  victims  is  termed  by  Fuller,  in  his  Church  History,  "  our 
English  Vorstius."  The  king,  in  imitation  of  Henry  the  Eighth's  generosity 
to  Lambert,  held  a  personal  dispute  with  him,  and  concluded  it  by  delivering 
him  into  the  hands  of  the  executioner. 


188  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

ing.  One  Peacham,  a  Puritan  minister,  in  whose  study  there 
was  seized,  by  a  tyrannical  stretch  of  power,  a  manuscript  dis 
course  never  preached,  nor  intended  to  be  preached,  contain 
ing  censures  on  the  royal  government,  was,  by  the  king's  de 
sire,  first  tortured  on  the  rack,  and  then  condemned  to  the 
death  of  a  traitor. 

Some  of  the  Puritans  having  conceived  the  design  of  with 
drawing  to  Virginia,  where  they  hoped  that  distance  would  at 
least  mitigate  the  violence  of  oppression,  a  small  party  of  them 
did  actually  repair  thither  ;  and  a  larger  number  were  pre 
paring  to  follow,  when  Bancroft,  apprized  of  their  intention, 
obtained  a  proclamation  from  the  king,  commanding  that  none 
of  his  subjects  should  settle  in  Virginia  without  the  authority 
of  an  express  license  under  the  great  seal.  [1620.]  Thus 
harassed  and  oppressed  in  England,  and  denied  a  refuge  in 
Virginia,  the  Puritans  began  to  retire  in  considerable  numbers 
to  the  Protestant  states  of  the  continent  of  Europe  ;  and  the 
hopes  of  the  still  greater  and  increasing  portion  that  remained 
at  home  were  fixed  on  the  House  of  Commons.  In  this  as 
sembly  the  Puritan  ascendency  at  length  became  so  manifest, 
that,  in  spite  of  the  king's  proclamations  for  encouraging  mirth 
ful  games  on  Sunday,  a  bill  was  introduced  for  compelling  a 
more  strict  and  solemn  observance  of  the  day,  to  which  it  gave 
the  denomination  of  the  Sabbath  ;  and  when  one  member  ob 
jected  to  this  as  a  Puritan  appellation,  and  ventured  to  justify 
dancing  on  Sunday  by  a  jocose  misapplication  of  some  pas 
sages  of  Scripture,  he  was,  on  the  suggestion  of  Pym,  expelled 
from  the  House  for  his  profanity.1  But  we  have  now  reached 
the  period  at  which  we  forsake  the  main  stream  of  the  his 
tory  of  the  Puritans,  to  follow  the  fortunes  of  that  illustrious 
branch  which  was  destined  to  visit  and  ennoble  the  deserts 
of  America.  In  reviewing  the  strange  succession  of  events 
which  we  have  beheld,  and  the  various  impressions  they  have 
produced  on  our  minds,  it  may  perhaps  occur  to  some,  as  a 
humiliating  consideration,  that  the  crimes  and  follies,  the  cru 
elties  and  weaknesses,  which  would  excite  no  other  sentiments 
but  horror,  grief,  or  pity  in  an  angelic  beholder,  are  capable 

1  K.  James's  Works.    Journals  of  the  House  of  Commons.    Rymer.     Ncal. 
Stith's  Virginia.     Slate  Trials. 


CHAP.  I.]    RELIGIOUS  VIEWS  OF  JOHN  ROBINSON.  189 

of  presenting  themselves  in  such  an  aspect  to  less  purified 
eyes,  as  to  excite  the  splenetic  mirth  even  of  beings  whose 
nature  is  reproached  by  the  odious  or  absurd  display. 

•In  the  year  1610,  a  congregation  of  Brownists,  expelled  by 
royal  and  ecclesiastical  tyranny  from  their  native  land,  removed 
to  Ley  den,  where  they  were  permitted  to  establish  themselves 
in  peace  under  the  ministry  of  their  pastor,  John  Robinson.1 
This  excellent  person  may  be  justly  regarded  as  the  founder 
of  the  society  of  Independents,  having  been  the  first  teacher 
who  steered  a  middle  course  between  the  narrow  path  of 
Brownism  and  the  broader  Presbyterian  system  ;  to  one  or 
other  of  which  the  views  and  inclinations  of  the  Puritans  were 
now  generally  tending.  The  sentiments  which  he  entertained, 
when  he  first  quitted  his  country,  bore  the  impress  of  the  per 
secution  under  which  they  had  been  formed,  and  when  he 
commenced  his  ministry  at  Leyden  he  was  a  rigid  Brownist  ; 
but  after  he  had  seen  more  of  the  world,  and  enjoyed  oppor 
tunities  of  familiar  converse  with  learned  and  good  men  of  dif 
ferent  ecclesiastical  denominations,  he  began  to  entertain  a 
more  charitable  opinion  of  those  minor  differences,  which  he 
plainly  perceived  might  subsist  without  injury  to  the  essentials 
of  religion,  and  without  violating  charity  or  generating  discord. 
Though  he  always  maintained  the  legitimacy  and  expediency 
of  separating  from  the  established  Protestant  churches  in  the 
country  where  he  lived,  he  willingly  allowed  them  the  char 
acter  of  churches  substantially  Christian  ;  esteemed  it  lawful 
to  unite  with  them  in  preaching  and  prayer  ;  and  freely  ad 
mitted  their  members  to  partake  the  sacrament  of  the  Lord's 
Supper  with  his  own  congregation.  He  considered  that  each 
particular  church  or  society  of  Christians  possessed  the  power 
of  electing  its  officers,  administering  the  gospel  ordinances,  and 
exercising  over  its  own  members  every  necessary  act  of  dis 
cipline  and  authority  ;  and,  consequently,  that  it  was  indepen 
dent  of  all  ecclesiastical  synods,  convocations,  and  councils. 
He  admitted  the  expediency  of  synods  and  councils  for  com 
position  of  emergent  differences  between  particular  churches 

1  Cardinal  Bentivoglio,  in  his  Account  of  the  United  Provinces,  describes 
these  exiles  as  a  body  of  English  heretics,  called  Puritans,  who  had  resorted  to 
Holland  for  purposes  of  commerce. 


190  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

by  the  communication  of  friendly  advice  to  them  ;  but  denied 
their  competence  to  exercise  any  act  of  jurisdiction,  or  author 
itatively  to  impose  any  articles  or  canons  of  doctrine.  These 
sentiments  Robinson  recommended  to  esteem,  by  exemplify 
ing  in  his  life  and  demeanour  the  best  fruits  of  that  divine 
spirit  by  whose  tuition  they  were  imparted, — by  a  character 
and  behaviour,  in  which  the  most  eminent  faculties  and  the 
highest  attainments  were  leavened  and  controlled  by  the  pre 
dominating  influence  of  a  solemn,  affectionate  piety.1  [1620.] 

Enjoying  the  counsel  and  direction  of  such  a  pastor,  and 
entertaining  a  just  sense  of  his  value,  the  English  exiles  com 
posing  this  congregation  remained  for  ten  years  at  Ley  den,  in 
harmony  with  each  other  and  in  peace  with  their  neighbours. 
But  at  the  end  of  that  period,  the  same  pious  views  that  had 
prompted  their  original  departure  from  England  incited  them 
to  undertake  a  more  distant  migration.  They  beheld  with 
strong  concern  the  prevalence  around  them  of  manners  which 
they  esteemed  loose  and  profane  ;  more  particularly,  the  gen 
eral  neglect  among  the  Dutch  of  a  reverential  observance  of 
Sunday  ;  and  they  reflected  with  apprehension  on  the  danger 
to  which  their  children  were  exposed  from  the  natural  conta 
gion  of  habits  so  inimical  to  serious  piety.  Their  country, 
too,  still  retained  a  hold  on  their  affections  ;  and  they  were 
loath  to  behold  their  posterity  commingled  and  identified  with 
the  Dutch  population.  The  smallness  of  their  numbers,  to 
gether  with  the  difficulties  occasioned  by  difference  of  lan 
guage,  discouraged  them  from  attempting  to  propagate  in  Hol 
land  the  principles,  which,  with  so  much  peril  and  suffering, 
they  had  hitherto  maintained  ;  and  the  conduct  of  the  English 
government  extinguished  every  hope  of  toleration  in  their 
native  land.  The  famous  Jlrminian  Controversy,  moreover, 
which  was  now  raging  in  Holland  with  a  fury  that  produced 
the  barbarous  execution  of  the  Grand  Pensionary  Barne veldt 
and  the  imprisonment  of  the  illustrious  Grotius,  probably  con 
tributed  to  alienate  the  desires  of  the  English  exiles  from 
farther  residence  in  a  land  wiiere  the  Calvinistic  tenets  which 
they  cherished  were  thus  disgraced  by  practical  cruelty  and 

1  Mather's  Ecclesiastical  Hist,  of  New  England.    Neal.     Robinson's  JJpology 
for  the  Brawnists. 


CHAP.  I.]   EMIGRATION  TO  AMERICA  DETERMINED  ON.    191 

intolerance.  In  these  circumstances,  it  occurred  to  them  that 
they  might  combine  the  indulgence  of  their  patriotic  attachment 
with  the  propagation  of  their  religious  principles,  by  establish 
ing  themselves  in  some  remote,  sequestered  part  of  the  British 
dominions  ;  and  after  many  days  of  earnest  supplication  for 
the  counsel  and  direction  of  Heaven,  they  unanimously  deter 
mined  to  transport  themselves  and  their  families  to  the  territory 
of  America.  It  was  resolved  that  a  select  portion  of  the  con 
gregation  should  proceed  thither  before  the  rest,  to  prepare  a 
settlement  for  the  whole  ;  and  that  the  main  body  meanwhile 
should  continue  at  Ley  den  with  their  pastor.  In  choosing  the 
particular  scene  of  their  establishment,  they  hesitated  for  some 
time  between  the  territory  of  Guiana,  of  which  Sir  Walter 
Raleigh  had  published  a  most  dazzling  and  attractive  descrip 
tion  (mainly  the  offspring  of  his  pwn  lively  and  fertile  imagina 
tion)  ,  and  the  province  of  Virginia,  to  which  they  finally  gave 
the  preference  ;  but  Providence  had  ordained  that  their  resi 
dence  should  be  established  in  New  England. 

By  the  intervention  of  agents,  whom  they  deputed  to  solicit 
the  sanction  of  the  English  government  to  their  enterprise, 
they  represented  to  the  king,  "  that  they  were  well  weaned 
from  the  delicate  milk  of  their  mother  country,  and  inured  to 
the  difficulties  of  a  strange  land  ;  that  they  were  knit  together 
in  a  strict  and  sacred  bond,  by  virtue  of  which  they  held 
themselves  bound  to  take  care  of  the  good  of  each  other  and 
of  the  whoje  ;  and  that  it  was  not  with  them  as  with  other 
men,  whom  small  things  could  discourage,  or  small  discontent 
cause  to  wish  themselves  at  home  again."  The  king,  waver 
ing  between  his  desire  to  promote  the  colonization  of  America, 
and  his  reluctance  to  suffer  the  consciences  of  any  portion  of 
his  subjects  to  be  emancipated  from  his  control,  refused  to 
grant  them  a  charter  assuring  the  full  enjoyment  of  ecclesias 
tical  liberty,  but  promised  to  connive  at  their  practices,  and 
to  refrain  from  molesting  them.  They  were  forced  to  accept 
this  precarious  security,  and  would  hardly  have  obtained  it 
but  for  the  friendly  interposition  of  Sir  Robert  Nanton,  one 
of  the  secretaries  of  state,  and  a  favorer  of  the  Puritans  ;  but 
they  relied  with  more  reason  on  their  distance  from  the  eccle 
siastical  tribunals  of  England,  and  from  the  eye  and  arm  of 


192  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

their  persecuting  sovereign.  Having  procured  from  the  Ply 
mouth  Company  a  grant  of  a  tract  of  land,  situated,  as  was 
supposed,  within  the  limits  of  its  patent,  some  members  of  the 
congregation  sold  their  estates,  and  expended  the  purchase- 
money  in  the  equipment  of  two  vessels,  in  which  a  hundred 
and  twenty  of  their  number  were  appointed  to  embark  from  an 
English  port  for  North  America.1  [1620.] 

All  things  being  prepared  for  the  departure  of  this  detach 
ment  of  the  congregation  from  Delft  Haven,  where  they  took 
leave  of  their  associates,  for  the  English  port  of  ultimate  em 
barkation,  Robinson  and  his  people  devoted  their  last  meeting 
in  Europe  to  an  act  of  solemn  and  social  worship,  intended  to 
implore  a  blessing  from  Heaven  upon  the  hazardous  enterprise. 
He  preached  a  sermon  to  them  from  Ezra  viii.  21  :  —  /  pro 
claimed  a  fast  there,  at  the  river  of  Jlhava,  that  we,  might  afflict 
ourselves  before  our  God,  to  seek  of  him  a  right  way  for  us, 
and  for  our  little  ones,  and  for  all  our  substance ;  —  and  con 
cluded  his  discourse  with  the  following  exhortation,  to  which, 
with  the  fullest  perception  of  its  intrinsic  merits,  our  senti 
ments  will  fail  to  do  justice,  unless  we  remember  that  such  a 
spirit  of  Christian  candor  and  liberality  as  it  breathes  was  then 
hardly  known  in  the  world. 

"Brethren,"  said  he,  "we  are  now  quickly  to  part  from 
one  another,  and  whether  I  may  ever  live  to  see  your  faces  on 
earth  any  more  the  God  of  heaven  only  knows  ;  but  whether 
the  Lord  has  appointed  that  or  no,  I  charge  you,  before  God 
and  his  blessed  angels,  that  you  follow  me  no  farther  than  you 
have  seen  me  follow  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

"  If  God  reveal  any  thing  to  you  by  any  other  instrument 
of  his,  be  as  ready  to  receive  it  as  ever  you  were  to  receive 
any  truth  by  my  ministry  ;  for  I  am  verily  persuaded,  I  am 
very  confident,  the  Lord  has  more  truth  yet  to  break  forth  out 
of  his  holy  word.  For  my  part,  I  cannot  sufficiently  bewail 
the  condition  of  the  reformed  churches,  who  are  come  to  a 

1  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Hazard.  Oldmixon.  If  the  Puritans  would 
have  stooped  to  intrigue  and  duplicity,  they  might  have  had  more  powerful 
partisans  at  court  than  Sir  Robert  Nanton.  The  Duke  of  Buckingham,  in 
imitation  of  the  policy  of  Lord  Leicester  and  Lord  Essex,  in  the  preceding 
reign,  vainly  attempted  to  obtain  an  ascendency  over  the  Puritans  by  caressing 
their  leaders. 


CHAP.  I.]    ROBINSON'S  EXHORTATION  TO  HIS  FLOCK.      193 

period  in  religion,  and  will  go  at  present  no  farther  than  the 
instruments  of  their  reformation.  The  Lutherans  cannot  be 
drawn  to  go  beyond  what  Luther  saw  ;  whatever  part  of  his 
will  our  good  God  has  revealed  to  Calvin,  they  will  rather  die 
than  embrace  it ;  and  the  Calvinists,  you  see,  stick  fast  where 
they  were  left  by  that  great  man  of  God,  who  yet  saw  not  all 
things. 

"  This  is  a  misery  much  to  be  lamented  ;  for  though  they 
were  burning  and  shining  lights  in  their  times,  yet  they  pene 
trated  not  into  the  whole  counsel  of  God  ;  but,  were  they  now 
living,  would  be  as  willing  to  embrace  farther  light,  as  that 
which  they  first  received.  I  beseech  you,  remember  it,  't  is 
an  article  of  your  church  covenant,  that  you  be  ready  to  receive 
whatever  truth  shall  be  made  known  to  you  from  the  written 
word  of  God.  Remember  that,  and  every  other  article  of 
your  sacred  covenant.  But  I  must  herewithal  exhort  you  to 
take  heed  what  you  receive  as  truth.  Examine  it,  consider  it, 
and  compare  it  with  other  scriptures  of  truth,  before  you  re 
ceive  it ;  for  't  is  not  possible  the  Christian  world  should  come 
so  lately  out  of  antichristian  darkness,  and  that  perfection  of 
knowledge  should  break  forth  at  once. 

;  •  "I  must  also  advise  you  to  abandon,  avoid,  and  shake  off 
the  name  of  Brownist ;  't  is  a  mere  nickname,  and  a  brand  for 
the  making  religion,  and  the  professors  of  it,  odious  to  the 
Christian  world." 

Having  said  thus  much,  he  exchanged  with  them  embraces 
and  affectionate  farewells  ;  and  kneeling  down  with  them  all  on 
the  seashore,  commended  them,  in  a  fervent  prayer,  to  the 
blessing  and  protection  of  Heaven.1  Such  were  the  men  whom 
the  English  monarch  cast  out  of  his  dominions  ;  and  such  the 
scenes  of  wisdom  and  piety,  which  the  control  of  Divine  Provi 
dence  elicited  from  the  folly,  arrogance,  and  bigotry  of  a  tyrant. 

The  emigrants  were  at  first  driven  back  by  a  storm  which 
destroyed  one  of  their  vessels  ;  but  finally  reembarking  in  the 
other  at  Plymouth,  on  the  6th  of  September,  they  succeeded, 
after  a  long  and  dangerous  voyage,  in  reaching  the  coast  of 
America.  [9th  Nov.,  1620.]  Hudson's  River  was  the  place 

1  Mather.    Hazard. 
VOL.  i.  25 


194  HISTORY   OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

where  they  had  proposed  to  disembark,  and  its  banks  were  the 
scene  of  their  intended  settlement ;  but  the  Dutch,  who  con 
ceived  that  a  preferable  right  to  this  territory  accrued  to  them 
from  its  discovery  by  Captain  Hudson,  had  maintained  there, 
for  some  years,  a  small  commercial  establishment,  and  were 
actually  projecting  a  scheme  of  more  extensive  occupation, 
which  they  were  neither  disposed  to  forego,  nor  yet  prepared 
to  defend.  In  order  to  defeat  the  design  of  the  English,  they 
bribed  the  captain  of  the  vessel  in  which  the  emigrants  sailed, 
who  was  a  Dutchman,  to  carry  his  passengers  so  far  towards 
the  north,  that  the  first  land  which  they  reached  was  Cape 
Cod,  a  region  not  only  beyond  the  precincts  of  their  grant, 
but  beyond  the  territories  of  the  company  from  which  the  grant 
was  derived.  The  advanced  period  of  the  year,  and  the 
sickliness  occasioned  by  the  hardships  of  a  long  voyage,  com 
pelled  the  adventurers  to  settle  on  the  soil  to  which  they  were 
thus  conducted,  and  which  seemed  to  have  been  expressly  pre 
pared  and  evacuated  for  their  reception  by  a  pestilential  disease, 
which,  during  several  preceding  years,  had  swept  away  nine 
tenths  of  its  savage  and  idolatrous  population.  After  explor 
ing  the  coast,  they  chose  for  their  station  a  place  afterwards 
included  within  the  province  of  Massachusetts,  to  which  they 
gave  the  name  of  New  Plymouth,  in  commemoration  of  the 
city  with  which  their  last  recollections  of  England  were  asso 
ciated.  To  supply,  in  some  measure,  the  absence  of  a  more 
formal  title,  they  composed  and  subscribed  an  instrument  de 
claratory  of  the  purpose  with  which  they  had  come  to  Amer 
ica,  recognizing  the  sovereign  authority  of  the  English  crown, 
and  expressing  their  own  combination  into  a  body  politic,  and 
their  determination  to  enact  just  and  righteous  laws,  and  to 
evince  and  enforce  a  strict  obedience  to  them.1  Here,  then, 
remote  from  scenes  and  circumstances  of  temporal  grandeur, 
these  men  embarked  on  a  career,  which,  if  the  true  dignity  of 
human  actions  be  derived  from  the  motives  that  prompt  them, 
the  principles  they  express,  and  the  ends  they  contemplate, 

father.  Neal.  Oldmixon.  Hutchinson.  The  fraud  by  which  the  Dutch 
contrived  to  divert  these  emigrants  from  Hudson's  River  was  discovered  and 
stated  in  a  memorial,  which  was  published  in  England  before  the  close  of  this 
year.  Prince's  New  England  Chronology. 


CHAP.  I.]     SUFFERINGS  OF   THE   PLYMOUTH   COLONY.       195 

must  be  allowed  to  claim  no  common  measure  of  honor  and 
elevation.  To  live  for .  eternity,  and  in  the  prospect  of  it, 
they  deemed  the  great  business  of  their  lives  ;  this  was  a  just 
and  noble  calculation  of  the  value  of  existence. 

The  speedy  approach  and  intense  severity  of  their  first  win 
ter  in  America  painfully  convinced  the  settlers  that  a  more 
unfavorable  season  of  the  year  could  not  have  been  selected 
for  the  plantation  of  their  colony  ;  and  that  the  slender  stores 
with  which  they  were  provided  were  greatly  short  of  what  was 
requisite  to  comfortable  subsistence,  and  formed  a  very  inade 
quate  preparation  to  meet  the  rigor  of  the  climate.  Their 
exertions  to  procure  for  themselves  suitable  dwellings  were 
obstructed,  for  a  time,  by  the  hostile  attacks  of  some  of  the 
neighbouring  Indians,  who  had  not  forgotten  the  injurious  con 
duct  of  Captain  Hunt ;  and  the  colonists  had  scarcely  suc 
ceeded  in  repulsing  them,  when  sickness,  occasioned  by  scar 
city  of  provisions  and  the  increasing  horrors  of  the  season, 
afflicted  them  with  a  calamity,  perhaps  less  dangerous  to  their 
virtue,  but  more  fatal  to  their  strength  and  security,  than  the 
perils  of  war.  More  than  one  half  of  their  number,  including 
John  Carver,  their  first  governor,  perished  by  hunger  or  dis 
ease  before  the  return  of  spring  ;  and  during  the  whole  of  the 
winter,  only  a  few  were  capable  of  providing  for  themselves, 
or  rendering  assistance  to  the  rest.  But  hope  and  virtue  sur 
vived  ;  and,  rising  in  vigor  beneath  the  pressure  of  accumu 
lated  suffering,  surmounted  and  ennobled  every  circumstance 
of  distress.  [1621.]  Those  who  retained  their  strength  be 
came  the  servants  of  the  weak,  the  afflicted,  and  the  dying  ; 
and  none  distinguished  himself  more  in  this  humane  employ 
ment  than  Carver,  the  governor.  He  was  a  man  of  large  estate, 
but  more  enlarged  benevolence  ;  he  had  spent  his  whole  for 
tune  on  the  colonial  project  ;  and  now,  willingly  contributing 
his  life  to  its  accomplishment,  he  exhausted  a  feeble  body  in 
laboriously  discharging  the  humblest  offices  of  kindness  and 
^service  to  the  sick.  He  was  succeeded  by  William  Bradford, 
who,  inheriting  the  merit  and  the  popularity  of  his  predecessor, 
was  reelected  to  the  same  office  for  many  successive  years,  — 
notwithstanding  his  own  earnest  desire  to  be  released  from  the 
charge,  and  his  oft  repeated  remonstrance,  that,  if  this  office 


196  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

were  an  honor,  it  should  be  shared  by  his  fellow-citizens,  and 
if  it  were  a  burden,  the  weight  of  it  should  not  always  be  im 
posed  upon  him. 

When  the  distress  of  the  colonists  was  at  its  height,  the  ap 
proach  of  a  powerful  Indian  chief  with  a  band  of  his  followers 
seemed  to  portend  their  utter  destruction  ;  but,  happily,  in  the 
train  of  this  personage  was  the  ancient  guest  and  friend  of  the 
English,  Squanto,  who  eagerly  and  successfully  labored  to 
mediate  a  good  understanding  between  them  and  his  country* 
men.  He  afterwards  cancelled  the  merit  of  this  useful  service, 
and  endeavoured  to  magnify  his  own  importance  by  fabricating 
charges  of  plots  and  conspiracies  against  some  of  the  neigh 
bouring  tribes,  while  at  the  same  time  he  maintained  an  empire 
of  terror  over  these  tribes  by  secretly  assuring  them  that  the 
English  were  in  possession  of  a  cask  filled  with  the  plague, 
which  only  his  influence  prevented  them  from  setting  abroach 
for  the  destruction  of  the  Indians.  But,  before  he  resorted 
to  this  mischievous  policy,  the  colonists  had  become  indepen 
dent  of  his  services.  His  friendship  with  the  English  was 
never  entirely  dissolved  ;  and  on  his  death-bed,  soon  after,  he 
desired  Governor  Bradford  to  pray  for  him,  that  he  might  go 
to  the  Englishman's  God  in  heaven.  Some  of  the  neighbour 
ing  tribes,  from  time  to  time,  made  alarming  demonstrations  of 
hostility  ;  but  they  were  at  length  completely  overawed  by  the 
conduct  and  valor  of  Captain  Miles  Standish,  a  gallant  and 
skilful  officer,  who,  with  a  handful  of  men,  was  always  ready 
to  encounter  their  strongest  force,  and  foil  their  most  dexterous 
stratagems  and  rapidest  movements.1 

On  the  arrival  of  summer,  the  health  of  the  colonists  was 
restored  ;  and  their  numbers  continued  to  be  recruited  occa 
sionally,  by  successive  emigrations  of  oppressed  Puritans  from 
Europe.  But  these  additions  fell  far  short  of  their  expecta 
tions  ;  and  of  the  reinforcement  which  they  had  mainly  looked 
for  from  the  accession  of  the  remanent  congregation  at  Leyden, 
they  were  unhappily  disappointed.  The  unexpected  death  of 

1  Mather.  Neal.  OHmixon.  Belknap's  American  Biography.  Peter  Martyr 
declares,  that  the  hardships  endured  by  the  Spaniards  in  South  America  were 
such  as  none  but  Spaniards  could  have  supported.  But  the  hardships  sustained 
by  the  first  colonists  of  New  Plymouth  appear  to  have  exceeded  them  both  in 
duration  and  intensity.  See  Hutchinson,  II.,  Appendix. 


CHAP.  I.]        ECCLESIASTICAL  AND  CIVIL  SYSTEM.  197 

Robinson,  their  pastor,  deprived  his  people  of  the  only  leader 
whose  animating  counsels  could  have  overcome  the  timidity 
inspired  by  the  accounts  of  the  manifold  hardships  and  dis 
tresses  sustained  by  their  friends  in  New  England  ;  and  upon 
that  event,  the  greater  part  of  those  who  had  remained  behind 
at  Ley  den  now  retired  to  join  the  other  English  exiles  at 
Amsterdam,  and  very  few  had  the  courage  to  proceed  to  New 
Plymouth.  This  small  colony,  however,  had  displayed  a 
hardy  virtue  that  showed  it  was  formed  for  endurance  ;  and, 
having  surmounted  its  first  misfortunes,  continued  to  flourish  in 
the  cultivation  of  piety,  and  the  enjoyment  of  religious  and 
political  freedom.  A  generous  attachment  was  formed  to  the 
soil  which  had  been  so  worthily  earned,  and  to  the  society 
whose  continuance  attested  so  manly  and  glorious  a  struggle 
with  every  variety  of  ill.  While  the  colonists  demonstrated  a 
proper  respect  for  the  claims  of  the  original  inhabitants  of  the 
country,  by  purchasing  from  them  the  territory  over  which 
their  settlement  extended,  they  neglected  no  preparation  to 
defend  by  force  what  they  had  acquired  with  justice  ;  and, 
alarmed  by  the  tidings  of  the  massacre  of  their  countrymen  in 
Virginia,  they  erected  a  timber  fort  [1622],  and  adopted  other 
prudent  precautions  for  their  security.  This  purchase  from 
savages,  who  rather  occasionally  traversed  than  permanently 
occupied  the  territory,  is  perhaps  the  first  instance  on  record 
of  the  entire  prevalence  of  the  principles  of  justice  in  a  treaty 
between  a  civilized  and  a  barbarous  people. 

The  ecclesiastical  constitution  which  the  emigrants  estab 
lished  was  the  same  with  that  which  had  prevailed  among  them 
at  Ley  den  ;  and  their  system  of  civil  government  was  founded 
on  those  ideas  of  the  natural  equality  of  men,  to  which  their  re 
ligious  policy,  so  long  the  main  object  of  their  concern,  had 
habituated  their  minds.  The  supreme  legislative  body  was 
composed  at  first  of  all  the  freemen  who  were  members  of  the 
church  ;  and  it  was  not  until  the  year  1639  that  they  estab 
lished  a  house  of  representatives.  The  executive  power  was 
committed  to  a  governor  and  council,  annually  elected  by  the 
members  of  the  legislative  assembly.  Their  jurisprudence  was 
founded  on  the  laws  of  England,  with  some  diversity  in  the 
appreciation  and  punishment  of  crimes,  wherein  they  approxi- 


198  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

mated  more  nearly  to  the  Mosaic  institutions.  Deeming  the 
protection  of  morals  more  important  than  the  preservation  of 
wealth,  they  punished  fornication  with  flogging,  and  adultery 
with  death,  —  while  on  forgery  they  inflicted  only  a  moderate 
fine.  The  clearing  and  cultivation  of  the  ground,  fishing,  and 
the  curing  of  fish  for  exportation,  formed  the  temporal  occu 
pations  of  the  colonists.  The  peculiarity  of  their  situation 
naturally  led  them,  like  the  Virginians,  for  some  time  to  throw 
all  their  property  into  a  common  stock,  and,  like  members  of 
one  family,  to  carry  on  every  work  of  industry  by  their  joint 
labor  for  the  public  behoof.  But  the  religious  zeal  which  pro 
moted  this  self-denying  policy  was  unable  to  overcome  the 
difficulties  which  must  always  attend  it,  and  which  are  pecu 
liarly  aggravated  in  a  society  deriving  its  principle  of  increment 
not  so  much  from  internal  growth  as  from  the  confluence  of 
strangers.  About  three  years  after  the  foundation  of  New 
Plymouth,  it  was  judged  proper  to  introduce  separation  of 
possessions,  though  the  full  right  of  separate  property  was  not 
admitted  till  a  much  later  period ;  and  even  that  first  change  is 
represented  as  having  produced  a  great  and  manifest  improve 
ment  of  the  industry  of  the  people.1 

The  slow  increase,  which,  for  a  considerable  period  of  time, 
the  population  of  the  colony  exhibited,  has  been  ascribed  to 
the  prolonged  operation  of  this  system  of  equality  ;  but  it  seems 
more  likely  that  the  slowness  of  the  increase  (occasioned  by 
the  poverty  of  the  soil  and  the  report  of  the  hardships  attending 
a  settlement  in  New  England)  was  itself  the  reason  why  the 
complete  ascertainment  of  the  rights  of  separate  property  was 
so  long  retarded.  In  the  first  society  of  men  collected  by  the 
bond  of  Christianity,  and  additionally  united  by  persecution, 
we  find  an  attempt  made  to  abolish  individual  property  ;  and 
from  the  apostolic  direction,  that  he  who  would  not  work  should 
not  eat,  we  may  conclude  that  the  disadvantage,  which  the  op 
eration  of  this  principle  is  exposed  to  in  a  society  mainly  deriv 
ing  its  increase  from  the  accession  of  strangers  of  dissimilar 
characters,  was  pretty  early  experienced.  In  Paraguay,  the 
Jesuits  formed  a  settlement  where  this  peculiar  disadvantage 

1  Mather.     Neal.     Chalmers. 


CHAP.  I.]  CHARTER  OF  THE  PLYMOUTH  COLONY.     199 

was  not  experienced,  and  which  affords  the  only  authenticated 
instance  of  the  introduction  and  protracted  endurance  of  a  state 
of  equality  in  a  numerous  society.  But  there  the  great  funda 
mental  difficulty  was  rather  evaded  than  encountered,  by  a 
system  of  tuition,  adapted,  with  exquisite  skill,  to  confound  all 
diversities  of  talent  and  disposition  among  the  savage  or  bar 
barous  natives  in  an  unbounded  and  degrading  dependence  on 
their  Jesuit  instructors. 

After  remaining  for  some  years  without  a  patent  legalizing 
their  territorial  occupation,  the  colonists,  whose  numbers  now 
amounted  to  a  hundred  and  eighty,  employed  one  Pierce  as 
their  agent  in  England,  to  solicit  a  grant  of  this  nature  from  the 
English  government,  and  the  Grand  Council  of  Plymouth,  —  a 
new  corporation,  by  which  James,  in  the  year  1620,  had  super 
seded  the  original  Plymouth  Company,  and  on  which  he  con 
ferred  all  the  American  territory  lying  between  the  fortieth  and 
forty-eighth  degrees  of  north  latitude.  This  corporate  body 
continued  to  subsist  for  a  considerable  time,  notwithstanding  a 
vote  of  the  House  of  Commons,  in  the  year  after  its  creation, 
declaring  its  privileges  a  public  grievance,  and  its  patent  void. 
Pierce  ~  procured  a  charter  from  the  council,  and  caused  it  to 
be  framed  in  his  own  name,  with  the  appropriation  of  large  ter 
ritories  and  privileges  to  himself  and  his  family  [1623]  ;  but, 
having  embarked  with  a  numerous  body  of  associates,  whom 
he  collected  in  England,  and  induced  to  accompany  him,  and 
assist  in  the  prosecution  of  his  ambitious  designs,  his  vessel 
was  shipwrecked,  and  Pierce  himself  so  dismayed  with  the 
disastrous  issue  of  his  enterprise,  that  he  made  a  public  decla 
ration  of  remorse,  and  resigned  his  unjust  acquisition.  The 
colonists,  informed  of  their  agent's  treachery,  despatched  Wins- 
low,  one  of  their  own  number,  to  resume  the  solicitation  for  a 
charter.  Winslow  did  not  succeed  in  procuring  a  patent  from 
the  crown,  but  he  obtained,  after  a  long  delay,  a  grant  of  land 
and  a  charter  of  privileges  from  the  council.  It  was  directed 
[Jan.  1630]  to  William  Bradford,  the  existing  governor  ;  and 
the  immunities  it  bestowed  were  appropriated  to  him,  his 
heirs,  associates,  and  assignees  ;  but  Bradford  instantly  sur- 

1  January,  1630. 


200  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

rendered  all  that  was  personal  in  the  charter  and  grant,  and 
associated  the  general  court  of  the  freemen  to  the  privileges  it 
conferred.1 

By  this  charter  of  the  Grand  Council  of  Plymouth,  the 
colonists  were  authorized  to  choose  a  governor,  council,  and 
general  court,  for  the  enactment  and  execution  of  laws  instru 
mental  to  the  public  good.  Some  American  historians  have 
mistaken  this  charter  for  a  patent  from  the  crown.  But  no 
such  patent  was  ever  issued  ;  and  the  social  community  of 
New  Plymouth  was  never  incorporated  with  due  legal  formality 
into  a  body  politic,  but  remained  a  subordinate  and  voluntary 
municipal  association,  until  it  was  united  to  its  more  powerful 
neighbour,  the  colony  of  Massachusetts.  Both  before  and 
after  the  reception  of  their  charter,  the  colonists  were  aware  of 
the  doubts  that  might  be  entertained  of  the  validity  of  the  acts 
of  government  which  their  magistrates  exercised.  This  cir 
cumstance,  perhaps,  was  not  altogether  unfavorable  to  the  in 
terests  of  the  people,  and  may  have  contributed  to  the  liberal 
principles  and  conciliatory  strain  by  which  the  administration 
of  their  domestic  government  was  honorably  distinguished  from 
that  which  afterwards  unhappily  prevailed  among  their  neighbours 
in  New  England.  But  the  soil  around  New  Plymouth  was  so 
meagre,  and  the  supplies  received  by  the  planters  from  Europe 
were  so  scanty  and  infrequent,  that  in  the  tenth  year  of  their 
colonial  existence  their  numbers  did  not  exceed  three  hundred.2 
Their  exertions,  nevertheless,  were  productive  of  consequences 
most  happy  and  interesting.  They  held  up  to  the  view  of  the 
oppressed  Puritans  in  the  parent  state  a  retreat  to  which  perse 
cuted  virtue  might  retire,  and  where  only  the  enduring  virtue 
which  persecution  had  failed  to  conquer  seemed  capable  of  ob 
taining  a  permanent  establishment.  At  the  expense  of  the  noblest 
sacrifices  and  most  undaunted  efforts,  this  handful  of  men  laid 
the  foundation  of  civilized  and  Christian  society  in  New  Eng 
land.  A  few  years  after  their  arrival  at  New  Plymouth,  a  mes 
senger  was  despatched  to  this  colony  by  the  governor  of  the 
Dutch  plantation  on  Hudson's  River,  with  letters  congratu 
lating  the  English  on  their  prosperous  and  commendable  enter- 

1  Hazard.     Chalmers.     Trumbull's  History  of  Connecticut. 
*  Neal.     Chalmers.     See  Note  V.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 


CHAP.  I.]     PLANTATIONS   BY   WESTON   AND   GORGES.       201 

prise,  tendering  the  good-will  and  friendly  services  of  the 
Dutch,  and  proposing  a  commercial  intercourse  between  the 
two  settlements.  The  governor  and  council  of  Plymouth  re 
turned  a  courteous  answer,  expressing  their  grateful  remem 
brance  of  the  hospitality  which  they  had  received  in  the  native 
country  of  the  Dutch,  and  a  willing  acceptance  of  the  proffered 
friendship.1  Nothing  farther  ensued  from  this  overture  than 
a  series  of  small  commercial  dealings,  and  an  occasional  inter 
change  of  similar  civilities,  which,  but  a  few  years  after,  gave 
place  to  the  most  inveterate  jealousy,  and  a  continual  recipro 
cation  of  complaint  and  menace  between  the  Dutch  and  Eng 
lish  colonists. 

Various  attempts  had  latterly  been  made  to  emulate  the  suc 
cessful  establishment  of  New  Plymouth  ;  but  they  had  all  failed, 
in  consequence  of  the  neglect  or  inability  of  their  promoters  to 
emulate  the  virtues  from  which  the  success  of  this  colonial 
enterprise  was  derived.  In  the  year  1622,  a  rival  colony  was 
planted  in  New  England  by  one  Weston,  and  a  troop  of  disor 
derly  adventurers,  who,  in  spite  of  the  friendly  assistance  of  the 
settlers  at  New  Plymouth,  speedily  sunk  into  a  state  of  such 
misery  and  degradation,  that  several  of  them  were  reduced  to 
become  servants  to  the  Indians  ;  some  perished  by  hunger  ; 
others  betook  themselves  to  robbery,  and  by  their  depredations 
involved  both  themselves  and  the  colonists  of  New  Plymouth 
in  hostilities  with  the  natives  ;  and  the  rest  were  glad  to  find 
their  way  back  to  Europe.  In  the  following  year,  an  attempt 
was  made  on  a  larger  scale,  under  the  patronage  of  the  Grand 
Council  of  Plymouth,  which  bestowed  on  Captain  Gorges,  the 
leader  of  the  expedition,  the  title  of  governor-general  of  New 
England,  with  an  ample  endowment  of  arbitrary  power,  and  on 
a  clergyman  who  accompanied  him  the  office  of  bishop  and 
superintendent  of  all  churches  in  this  quarter  of  America.  But 
the  condition  of  New  England  was  very  ill  suited  to  the  enter 
tainment  of  such  functionaries,  and  the  introduction  of  such  in 
stitutions  ;  and  the  governor  and  bishop,  deserting  their  charge, 
made  haste  to  return  to  a  region  more  adapted  to  the  culture 
of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  dignity.  Of  their  followers,  some 

1  Collections  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society.     Neal. 

VOL.   i.  26 


202  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

retired  to  Virginia,  and  others  returned  to  England.1  At  a 
later  period  [1626],  a  similar  undertaking,  conducted  by 
Captain  Wollaston,  was  attended  with  a  repetition  of  the  same 
disastrous  issue.  The  followers  of  Wollaston  first  taught  the 
savage  inhabitants  of  this  part  of  America  the  use  of  firearms, 
—  a  lesson  which  ere  long  the  colonists  of  New  England  had 
abundant  reason  to  deplore.2  All  these  unsuccessful  plantations 
were  attempted  on  land  more  fertile,  and  in  situations  more 
commodious,  than  the  settlers  at  New  Plymouth  enjoyed. 
The  scene  of  their  brief  and  unprosperous  existence  was  the 
coast  of  Massachusetts  Bay,  where,  a  few  years  later,  a  colo 
ny,  which  was  formed  after  the  model  and  principles  of  the 
society  at  New  Plymouth,  and  whose  origin  now  claims  our 
attention,  afforded  the  second  example  of  a  successful  establish 
ment  in  New  England. 

The  reign  of  Charles  the  First  was  destined  to  produce  the 
consummation  and  the  retribution  of  royal  and  ecclesiastical 
tyranny.  Charles  committed  the  government  of  the  English 
church  to  men  wrho  openly  professed  the  most  arbitrary  prin 
ciples,  and  whose  sentiments  far  more  inclined  them  to  pro 
mote  an  approximation  to  the  rites  and  practices  of  the  church 
of  Rome  than  to  mediate  an  agreement  among  the  professors 
of  the  Protestant  faith.  Abbot,  the  archbishop  of  Canterbury, 
being  restrained  by  the  liberality  of  his  principles  and  the 

1  The  most  important  act  of  Captain  Gorges'  administration,  that  has  been 
transmitted  to  us,  is  one  which  affords  an  explanation  of  a  passage  in  Hudibras, 
where  the  New  Englanders  are  accused  of  nanging  an  innocent,  but  bedrid, 
weaver,  instead  of  a  guilty,  but  useful,  cobbler  :  — 

"  That  sinners  may  supply  the  place 
Of  suffering  saints  is  a  plain  case. 
Our  brethren  of  New  England  use 
Choice  malefactors  to  excuse, 
And  hang  the  guiltless  in  their  stead, 
Of  whom  the  churches  have  less  need,  — 
As  lately  happened.     In  a  town 

There  lived  a  cobbler,"  &c.  Hudilras. 

Some  of  Gorges's  peopie  had  committed  depredations  on  the  Indians,  who  in 
sisted  that  the  ringleader  should  be  put   to  death.     Gorges  satisfied  and  de 
ceived  them  by  hanging  up  either  a  dying  man  or  a  dead  body.     Hutchinson. 
Butler's  witty  malice,  studious  to  defame  the  Puritans,  has  rescued  from  obliv 
ion  an  act,  of  which  the  whole  merit  or  demerit  is  exclusively  due  to  his  own 
5 arty.    Morrell,  the  clergyman  who  accompanied  Gorges,  notwithstanding  his 
isappointment,  conceived  a  very  favorable  opinion  of  New  England,  which 
he  expressed  in  an  elegant  Latin  poem  descriptive  of  the  country. —  Collections 
of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society. 
*  Neal.     Oldmixon  (2d  edit.). 


CHAP.  I.]     OBNOXIOUS  MEASURES  OF  LAUD.         203 

mildness  of  his  temper  from  lending  his  instrumentality  to  the 
views  of  the  court,  was  treated  with  harshness,  and,  at  length, 
finally  suspended  from  his  office  [1627],  of  which  the  func 
tions  were  committed  to  a  board  of  prelates,  of  whom  the 
most  eminent  was  Laud,  who  afterwards  succeeded  to  the 
primacy.  From  this  period,  both  in  the  civil  and  ecclesiastical 
administration  of  the  realm,  a  system  of  deliberate  and  insolent 
invasion  of  every  right  most  valued  by  freemen  and  most 
revered  by  Protestants  was  pursued  with  a  stubborn  pride, 
folly,  and  cruelty,  that  at  length  exhausted  the  patience  of  the 
English  people.  To  the  historian  of  England  the  political 
abuses  that  distinguished  this  period  will  probably  appear  the 
most  interesting  features  in  its  history ;  and,  doubtless,  they 
contributed  at  least  as  powerfully  as  any  other  cause  to  the 
production  of  the  ensuing  scene  of  civil  rage  and  warfare. 
But,  as  it  was  the  ecclesiastical  administration  that  mainly 
conduced  to  the  peopling  of  America,  it  is  this  branch  of  the 
English  history  that  chiefly  merits  our  attention,  in  investigating 
the  sources  of  the  colonization  of  New  England. 

Not  only  were  the  ancient  ceremonial  observances,  which 
long  oppression  had  rendered  so  obnoxious,  exacted  with  addi 
tional  rigor  from  the  increasing  numbers  of  the  Puritans,  but 
new  and  more  offensive  rites  were  added  to  the  ecclesiastical 
canons.  A  design  seems  to  have  been  formed  of  enabling  the 
church  of  England  to  vie  with  the  Romish  see  in  splendid 
pageantry,  elaborate  ceremonial,  and  temporal  power.  Laud, 
indeed,  boasted  that  he  had  refused  the  offer  of  a  cardinal's 
hat  from  Rome  ;  but  the  offer  was  justly  considered  a  more 
significant  circumstance  than  the  refusal  ;  and,  having  already 
assumed  to  himself  the  papal  title  of  His  Holiness,  which  he 
substituted  in  place  of  His  Grace,  his  titular  style  would  have 
been  lowered  instead  of  elevated  by  the  Romish  promotion 
which  he  rejected.  The  communion  table  was  converted  into 
an  altar,  and  all  persons  were  commanded  to  bow  to  it  on 
entering  the  church.  [1627.]  All  the  week-day  lectures,  and 
all  afternoon  sermons  on  Sunday,  were  abolished  ;  and,  instead 
of  them,  games  and  sports  were  permitted  to  all  the  people, 
"  excepting  known  recusants,"  who  were  thus,  with  matchless 
absurdity,  penally  debarred  from  practices  which  they  regarded 


204  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

with  the  utmost  detestation.  Every  minister  was  commanded, 
under  pain  of  deprivation  of  his  benefice,  to  read  from  the 
pulpit  a  royal  proclamation  recommendatory  of  games  and 
sports  on  Sunday.  This  ordinance,  like  all  the  other  novelties, 
was  productive  of  the  greater  dissatisfaction,  from  the  extent 
to  which  Puritan  sentiments  had  penetrated  into  the  church, 
and  the  number  of  Puritan  ministers  within  the  establishment 
whom  habit  had  taught  to  fluctuate  between  the  fulfilment  and 
the  evasion  of  the  ancient  obnoxious  canons,  and  trained 
partially  to  submit,  without  at  all  reconciling  to  the  burden. 
Nothing  could  be  more  ill-timed  than  an  aggravation  of  the 
load  under  which  these  men  were  laboring  ;  it  reduced  many 
to  despair,  inflamed  others  with  vindictive  resentment,  and 
deprived  the  church  of  a  numerous  body  of  her  most  zealous 
and  most  popular  ministers.  Nor  were  these  the  only  meas 
ures  of  the  day  that  were  calculated  to  excite  discontents 
within  as  well  as  without  the  pale  of  the  ecclesiastical  estab 
lishment.  Three  fourths  of  the  English  clergy  were  Calvin- 
ists  ;  yet  Laud  and  the  ruling  prelates,  who  were  Arminians, 
caused  a  royal  edict  to  be  issued  against  the  promulgation  of 
the  Calvinistic  tenets  ;  and  while  the  Arminian  pulpits  re 
sounded  with  the  sharpest  invectives  against  these  tenets,  a 
single  sentence  that  could  be  construed  into  their  defence 
exposed  the  preacher  to  the  undefined  and  arbitrary  penalty 
attached  to  contempt  of  the  king's  authority. 

In  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  the  Churchmen  were  eager  to  shift 
from  themselves  upon  the  courts  of  common  law  as  great  a 
portion  as  they  could  of  the  odium  of  administering  the  eccle 
siastical  statutes.  But  Laud  and  his  associates,  inaccessible 
to  fear,  remorse,  or  shame,  courted  a  monopoly  of  the  func 
tion  and  repute  of  persecution  ;  and  in  the  Court  of  High  Com 
mission  exercised  such  arbitrary  power,  and  committed  such 
enormous  cruelty,  as  procured  to  this  odious  tribunal  the  name 
of  the  Protestant  Inquisition.  Fines,  imprisonment,  banish 
ment,  the  pillory,  were  the  most  lenient  of  the  punishments 
inflicted  by  the  judges  who  presided  in  it.  Its  victims  were 
frequently  condemned  to  have  their  flesh  torn  from  their  bodies 
by  the  lash  of  the  executioner,  their  nostrils  slit,  and  their 
ears  cut  off ;  and  in  this  condition  were  exhibited  to  the  peo- 


CHAP.  I.]     TYRANNICAL  CIVIL  POLICY  OF  CHARLES  I.     205 

pie  as  monuments  of  what  was  termed  the  righteous  justice 
of  their  sovereign  and  the  holy  zeal  of  the  prelates.  Of  the 
extent  to  which  this  tyrannical  policy  was  carried  some  notion 
may  be  formed  from  the  accounts  that  have  been  transmitted 
to  us  of  the  proceedings  within  the  diocese  of  Norwich  alone. 
In  the  articles  of  impeachment  subsequently  exhibited  against 
Bishop  Wren,  it  is  affirmed,  that,  during  his  possession  of  that 
diocese,  which  lasted  only  for  two  years  and  a  half,  fifty  minis 
ters  were  ejected  from  their  pulpits  for  not  complying  with  the 
prescribed  innovations,  and  three  thousand  of  the  laity  were 
compelled  to  abandon  the  kingdom.1 

Consonant  with  the  ecclesiastical  was  the  civil  policy  of 
Charles's  government.  Parliamentary  taxation  was  superseded 
by  royal  imposts  ;  the  tenure  of  judicial  office  was  altered 
from  the  good  behaviour  of  the  judges  to  the  arbitrary  pleasure 
of  the  king  ;  every  organ  of  liberty  was  suspended  or  per 
verted  ;  and  the  kingdom  at  length  subjected  to  the  exclusive 
dominion  of  a  stern  and  uncontrolled  prerogative.  Insult  was 
employed,  as  if  purposely  to  stimulate  the  sensibility  which 
injuries  might  not  have  sufficiently  awakened.  A  clergyman 
having  alleged,  in  a  sermon  which  he  preached  before  the 
court,  that  his  Majesty's  simple  requisition  of  money  from  his 
subjects  obliged  them  to  comply  with  it  "  under  pain  of  eter 
nal  damnation,"  Charles  at  first  coldly  remarked  that  he  owed 
the  man  no  thanks  for  giving  the  king  his  due  ;  but  when  the 
discourse  attracted  a  censure  of  the  House  of  Commons,  its 
author  was  forthwith  accounted  a  proper  object  of  royal  favor, 
and  promoted,  first  to  a  valuable  benefice,  and  afterwards  to 
a  bishopric.2  A  system  of  such  diffusive  and  exasperating 
insolence  and  violence,  employed  by  the  government  against  a 
numerous  and  increasing  body  of  the  people,  needed  only 
sufficient  duration  to  provoke  from  general  rage  a  vindictive 
retribution,  the  more  to  be  dreaded  from  the  patience  with 
which  the  heavy  arrear  of  injury  had  been  endured  and  per 
mitted  to  accumulate.  But  before  this  tyrannical  system  had 
time  to  mature  the  growing  discontents,  and  to  produce  ex 
tremities  so  perilous  to  the  moderation  and  humanity  of  all 

1  Neal. 

*  Sanderson's  Life  of  Charles  the  First.    Rushworth's  Hist.  Collect. 


206  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

who  were  to  abide  them,  it  was  destined  to  inspire  efforts  of 
nobler  energy  and  purer  virtue  ;  much  good  was  to  be  educed 
from  the  scene  of  evil  and  disorder  ;  and  great  and  happy 
consequences  were  yet  to  be  engendered  by  the  steady  and 
beneficent  dominion  of  Providence  over  the  malevolent  and 
irregular  passions  of  men. 

The  severities  exercised  on  the  Puritans  in  England,  and 
the  gradual  extinction  of  their  fondly  cherished  hopes  of  a 
mitigation  of  ecclesiastical  rigor,  had  for  some  time  directed 
their  thoughts  to  that  distant  territory  in  which  their  brethren 
at  New  Plymouth  had  achieved  a  secure  establishment  and 
attained  the  enjoyment  of  civil  and  religious  liberty.  In  the 
last  year  of  James's  reign  [1625],  a  few  Non-conformist  fam 
ilies  removed  to  New  England  and  took  possession  of  a  corner 
of  Massachusetts  Bay  ;  but  being  disappointed  in  the  hope 
they  had  entertained  of  the  accession  of  a  sufficient  number  of 
associates  to  secure  the  formation  of  a  permanent  settlement, 
they  were  on  the  point  of  returning  to  Britain,  when  they  re 
ceived  the  agreeable  intelligence  of  the  approach  of  a  numer 
ous  reinforcement.  White,  a  Non-conformist  minister  at  Dor 
chester,  conceived  the  project  of  a  new  settlement  on  the  shore 
of  Massachusetts  Bay  ;  and  by  his  zeal  and  activity  he  suc 
ceeded  in  forming  an  association  of  a  number  of  the  gentry  in 
his  neighbourhood  who  cherished  Puritan  opinions,  for  the  pur 
pose  of  conducting  a  colony  to  that  region.  The  views  and 
sentiments  that  actuated  the  leaders  of  this  enterprise  were 
committed  to  writing,  and  circulated  among  their  friends  under 
the  title  of  General  Considerations  for  the  Plantation  of  New 
England. 

The  authors  of  this  remarkable  proclamation  began  by  al 
luding  to  the  progress  of  the  Jesuit  establishments  in  South 
America  ;  and  expatiated  on  the  duty  and  advantage  of  coun 
teracting  the  influence  of  these  institutions  by  the  introduction 
of  a  purer  system  of  Christianity  into  that  quarter  of  the 
world.  They  observed  that  all  the  other  churches  of  Europe 
had  been  brought  under  desolation  ;  that  the  same  fate  seemed 
to  impend  over  the  church  of  England  ;  and  that  it  might 
reasonably  be  supposed  that  the  Deity  had  provided  the  unoc 
cupied  territory  of  America  as  a  land  of  refuge  for  those  of 


CHAP.  I.]  SETTLEMENT  OF   SALEM.  207 

his  people  yet  inhabiting  the  scene  of  approaching  convulsion, 
whom  he  purposed  to  snatch  from  its  dangerous  vortex.  Eng 
land,  they  remarked,  grew  weary  of  her  inhabitants  ;  insomuch 
that  man,  the  most  precious  of  all  creatures,  was  there  reck 
oned  more  vile  and  base  than  the  earth  he  trod  on  ;  and  chil 
dren  and  friends  (if  unwealthy)  were  accounted  a  burdensome 
incumbrance,  instead  of  being  prized  and  relished  as  the 
choicest  of  earthly  blessings.  A  taste  for  expensive  living, 
they  added,  prevailed  so  strongly  among  their  countrymen,  and 
the  means  of  indulging  it  had  become  so  exclusively  the  ob 
ject  of  men's  desires,  that  all  arts  and  trades  were  tainted  by 
sordid  maxims  and  dishonest  practices  ;  and  the  English  semi 
naries  of  learning  abounded  with  so  many  spectacles  and  temp 
tations  of  dissolute  irregularity,  that  vice  was  there  more  ef 
fectually  communicated  by  example  than  knowledge  and  virtue 
were  imparted  by  precept.  "  The  whole  earth,"  they  de 
clared,  "  is  the  Lord's  garden,  and  he  hath  given  it  to  the 
sons  of  Adam  to  be  tilled  and  improved  by  them.  Why, 
then,  should  any  stand  starving  here  for  places  of  habitation, 
and  in  the  mean  time  suffer  whole  countries,  as  profitable  for 
the  use  of  man,  to  lie  waste  without  any  improvement  ?  " 
They  concluded  by  adverting  to  the  situation  of  the  colony  of 
New  Plymouth,  and  strongly  urged  the  duty  of  supporting  the 
infant  church  which  had  there  been  so  happily  planted. 

Actuated  by  such  views,  these  magnanimous  projectors  pur 
chased  from  the  Council  of  Plymouth  all  the  territory  extend 
ing  in  length  from  three  miles  north  of  the  River  Merrimac  to 
three  miles  south  of  Charles  River,  and  in  breadth  from  the  At 
lantic  to  the  Southern  Ocean.  [1628.]  Their  measures  were  as 
vigorous  as  their  designs  were  elevated.  As  the  precursors 
of  the  main  body  of  emigrants  whom  it  was  intended  to  trans 
port,  a  small  troop  of  planters  and  servants  were  despatched 
under  John  Endicott,  one  of  the  leading  projectors,  who,  arriv 
ing  safely  in  Massachusetts,  were  cordially  greeted  and  kindly 
assisted  by  the  colonists  of  New  Plymouth,  and  laid  the  foun 
dations  of  a  town,  which  they  denominated  Salem,  from  a 
Hebrew  word  that  signifies  peace.1  [1628.] 

1  Mather.  Neal.  An  earlier  writer  than  these  has  described  Endicott  as 
"a  fit  instrument  to  begin  this  wilderness  work ;  of  courage  bold,  undaunted, 


208  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

But  all  the  ardor  and  enthusiasm  of  these  adventurers 
could  not  blind  them  to  the  perception  of  their  inability  to 
maintain  effectual  possession  of  the  extensive  territory  that  was 
ceded  to  them,  without  the  participation  of  more  opulent  co 
adjutors  in  the  enterprise  ;  of  whom,  chiefly  by  the  influence 
and  activity  of  White,  they  were  enabled  to  procure  a  sufficient 
number  in  London,  among  the  commercial  men  who  openly  pro 
fessed,  or  secretly  favored,  the  tenets  of  the  Puritans.  These 
auxiliaries  brought  an  accession  of  prudent  forecast,  as  well  as 
of  pecuniary  resources,  to  the  conduct  of  the  design  ;  and 
justly  doubting  the  expediency  of  founding  a  colony  on  the 
basis  of  a  grant  from  a  company  of  patentees,  who  might,  in 
deed,  convey  a  right  of  property  in  the  soil,  but  could  not 
confer  municipal  jurisdiction,  or  the  privilege  of  governing  the 
society  which  it  was  proposed  to  establish,  they  persuaded  their 
associates  to  unite  with  them  in  an  application  to  the  crown  for 
a  royal  charter. 

The  readiness  with  which  this  application  was  granted  [4th 
March,  1629],  and  the  liberal  tenor  of  the  charter  which  was 
obtained,  are  perfectly  unaccountable,  except  on  the  supposi 
tion  that  the  king  and  his  counsellors  were  willing,  at  this  sea 
son,  even  at  the  expense  of  some  concessions  to  the  Puri 
tans,  to  disencumber  the  realm,  in  which  they  were  preparing 
to  introduce  the  ecclesiastical  innovations  to  which  we  have  al 
ready  adverted,  of  a  body  of  men  from  whom  the  most  un 
bending  opposition  to  the  new  measures  might  be  expected  ; 
a  politic  design  which  appears  sufficiently  credible  ;  although, 
at  a  subsequent  period,  Charles  and  his  ministers  resorted  to 
an  opposite  line  of  policy,  when  they  were  sensible  of  the  re 
flective  influence  exercised  on  the  Puritan  body  in  England  by 
the  spread  and  predominance  of  their  tenets  in  America.  It 
seems  impossible,  on  any  other  supposition,  to  account  for  the 
remarkable  facts,  that,  at  the  very  time  when  this  monarch  was 

Jet  sociable,  and  of  a  cheerful  spirit,  loving,  or  austere,  as  occasion  served." 
ohnson's  Wonder-working  Providence  in  Nr.w  England.  (London,  1654.) 
This  contemporary  historian  of  the  first  emigrations  from  Britain  to  New  Eng 
land  represents  their  leaders  as  "  gentlemen  of  good  estate  and  reputation, 
descendants  or  connections  of  noble  families ;  having  large  means,  and  great 
yearly  revenue,  sufficient  in  all  reason  to  content;  wanting  nothing  of  a  world 
ly  nature  which  could  contribute  to  the  pleasures,  the  prospects,  or  the  splen 
dor  of  life." 


CHAP.  I.]       CHARTER  OF   MASSACHUSETTS  BAY.  209 

sanctioning  the  exercise  of  despotic  authority  in  Virginia,  he 
extended  to  a  colony  of  Puritans  a  constitution  containing  all 
the  immunities  of  which  the  Virginians  were  divested  ;  and 
that,  well  aware  of  the  purpose  of  the  applicants  to  escape 
from  the  constitutions  of  the  church  of  England,  he  granted 
them  a  charter  containing  ample  commendation  of  the  religious 
ends  they  had  in  view,  without  the  imposition  of  a  single  ordi 
nance  respecting  the  system  of  their  church  government,  or  the 
forms  and  ceremonies  of  their  worship.  Nay,  so  completely 
did  he  surrender  the  maxims  of  his  colonial  policy  to  the  de 
mands  of  the  projectors  of  a  Puritan  settlement,  that,  although 
he  had  recently  declared,  in  a  public  proclamation,  that  a  mer 
cantile  company  was  utterly  unfit  to  administer  the  affairs  of  a 
remote  colony  ;  yet,  on  the  present  occasion,  he  scrupled  not, 
in  compliance  with  the  wishes  of  the  mercantile  portion  of  the 
adventurers,  to  commit  the  supreme  direction  of  the  colony, 
which  was  to  be  planted  in  the  province  of  Massachusetts 
Bay,  to  a  corporation  consisting  chiefly  of  merchants  resident 
in  London. 

The  new  adventurers  were  incorporated  as  a  body  politic  ; 
and  their  right  to  the  territory  which  they  had  purchased  from 
the  Council  of  Plymouth  being  confirmed  by  the  king,  they 
were  empowered  to  dispose  of  the  soil,  and  to  govern  the 
people  who  should  settle  upon  it.  Among  other  patentees 
specially  named  in  this  charter  were  Sir  Henry  Rosewell,  one 
of  the  earliest  promoters  of  the  design  ;  Sir  Richard  Sallon- 
stall,  the  descendant  of  an  ancient  family  in  Northamptonshire  ; 
Isaac  Johnson,  son-in-law  of  the  Earl  of  Lincoln  ;  John  Ven, 
a  distinguished  citizen  of  London,  and  commemorated  by 
Clarendon,  as  leading  the  city  after  him  in  seditious  remon 
strances  ;  and  Samuel  Vassal,1  who  was  afterwards  member 

1  From  the  monument  erected  to  the  memory  of  this  man  by  his  great- 
grandson  at  Boston,  it  appears  that  he  was  the  son  of  the  gallant  John  Vassal, 
who,  in  1588,  at  his  own  expense,  equipped  and  commanded  two  ships  of  war 
against  the  Spanish  Armada.  The  son,  exerting  himself  as  strenuously 
against  domestic  tyranny  as  the  father  had  done  against  foreign  invasion,  was 
deprived  of  his  liberty  and  of  the  greater  part  of  his  fortune  by  the  Court  of 
Star  Chamber.  The  Long  Parliament  voted  him  upwards  of  £  10,000,  as  a 
compensation  for  his  losses,  and  resolved  that  his  personal  sufferings  should  be 
further  considered.  "  But  the  rage  of  the  times,  says  his  epitaph,  "  and  the 
neglect  of  proper  application  since,  have  left  to  his  family  only  the  honor  of 
that  vote  and  resolution."  —  Dodsley's  Annual  Register,  1766. 

VOL.    I.  27 


210  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

of  parliament  for  London,  and  had  already  signalized  himself 
by  a  strenuous  opposition  to  the  arbitrary  collection  of  tonnage 
and  poundage.  The  first  governor  of  the  company  and  the 
first  members  of  a  council  of  assistants  were  named  by  the 
king  ;  the  right  of  electing  their  successors  was  vested  in  the 
freemen  of  the  corporation.  The  executive  power  was  com 
mitted  to  the  governor  and  council ;  the  legislative,  to  the  body 
of  freemen,  who  were  empowered  to  enact  statutes  and  ordi 
nances  for  the  good  of  the  community,  not  inconsistent  with 
the  laws  of  England.  The  adventurers  obtained  the  same  tem 
porary  exemption  that  had  been  granted  to  the  Virginian  com 
pany  from  duties  on  goods  exported  or  imported  ;  and  it  was 
declared,  that,  notwithstanding  their  migration  to  America,  they 
and  their  descendants  should  be  entitled  to  all  the  rights  of 
home-born  subjects  of  England.1 

The  meaning  of  this  charter,  with  respect  to  the  ecclesiasti 
cal  rights  of  the  colonists  of  Massachusetts,  has  been  made  the 
subject  of  much  controversial  discussion.  By  the  Puritans 
and  the  Puritan  writers  of  that  age,  it  was  sincerely  believed, 
and  confidently  maintained,  that  the  intendment  of  the  charter 
was  to  bestow  on  the  colonists  unrestricted  liberty  to  regulate 
their  ecclesiastical  estate  by  the  dictates  of  their  own  judg 
ments  and  consciences.2  The  grantors  were  fully  aware,  and 
the  grantees  had  neither  the  wish  nor  the  power  to  conceal, 
that  the  object  of  the  intending  emigrants  was  to  make  a  peace 
able  secession  from  a  church  which  they  could  no  longer 
conscientiously  adhere  to,  and  to  establish  for  themselves,  at 
Massachusetts  Bay,  an  ecclesiastical  constitution  similar  to  that 
which  was  already  created  and  supported  without  objection  at 
New  Plymouth.  A  silent  acquiescence  in  such  designs  was 
all  that  could  reasonably  be  expected  from  the  king  and  his 
ministers  ;  and  when  this  emphatic  silence,  on  a  point  which 
could  not  but  be  intimately  present  to  the  thoughts  of  both  par 
ties,  is  coupled  with  the  king's  ready  departure,  on  the  same 
occasion,  from  all  the  arbitrary  principles  which  he  was  pre 
paring  to  enforce  in  every  other  branch  of  his  domestic  and 

1  Mather.    Neal.    Hutchinsen's  Collection  of  Massachusetts  Papers.   Hazard. 
Oldmixon  (2d  edit.). 

2  Mather.     Neal.     Neal's  History  of  the  Puritans. 


CHAP.  I.]       CHARTER  OF  MASSACHUSETTS  BAY.  211 

colonial  administration,  it  seems  to  follow,  by  inevitable  infer 
ence,  that  Charles  was  at  this  time  not  unwilling  to  make  a 
partial  sacrifice  of  authority,  in  order  to  rid  himself  of  those 
Puritan  petitioners  ;  and  that  the  interpretation  which  they 
gave  to  their  charter  was  perfectly  correct.  And  yet  writers 
have  not  been  wanting,  whom  enmity  to  the  Puritans  has  in 
duced  to  explain  this  charter  in  a  manner  totally  repugnant  to 
every  rule  of  legal  or  equitable  construction.  It  is  a  maxim 
of  English  law,  and  the  dictate  of  common  sense  and  universal 
equity,  that,  in  all  cases  where  the  import  of  a  compact  is 
doubtful,  the  bias  of  presumptive  construction  ought  to  incline 
against  the  pretensions  of  that  party  whose  office  it  was  to 
speak,  and  who  had  the  power  to  clear  every  ambiguity  away. 
In  defiance  of  this  rule,  those  writers  have  insisted  that  the  si 
lence  of  the  charter  respecting  the  ecclesiastical  state  of  the 
colony  implied  the  imposition  on  the  colonists  of  every  par 
ticular  ordinance  and  institution  of  the  church  of  England. 
The  most  eminent  writer  of  this  party  has  taken  occasion  from 
hence  to  reproach  the  colonists  of  Massachusetts  Bay  with 
having  laid  the  foundations  of  their  church  establishment  in 
fraud.  "  Without  regard,"  says  this  distinguished  author,  "  to 
the  sentiments  of  that  monarch,  under  the  sanction  of  whose 
authority  they  settled  in  America,  and  from  whom  they  derived 
right  to  act  as  a  body  politic,  and  in  contempt  of  the  laws  of 
England,  with  which  the  charter  required  that  none  of  their 
acts  or  ordinances  should  be  inconsistent,  they  adopted  in  their 
infant  church  that  form  of  policy  which  has  since  been  dis 
tinguished  by  the  name  of  Independent."  He  accounts  for  the 
pretermission  in  the  charter  of  a  particular  which  was  un 
questionably  uppermost  in  the  minds  of  both  parties,  by  re 
marking,  that  "  the  king  seems  not  to  have  foreseen,  nor  to  have 
suspected,  the  secret  intentions  of  those  who  projected  the 
measure  "  ;  and  he  explains  the  conduct  of  the  colonists,  by 
pronouncing  that  they  were  "  animated  with  a  spirit  of  inno 
vation  in  civil  policy  as  well  as  in  religion."  1  But  surely  no 
impartial  inquirer  will  ever  esteem  it  a  reproach  to  the  Puri 
tans,  driven  by  persecution  from  their  native  land,  that  they 

1  Robertson's  History  of  America,  B.  x. 


212  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

did  not  cross  the  Atlantic  Ocean  and  settle  in  a  desert  for  the 
purpose,  or  with  the  intention,  of  cultivating  a  more  perfect 
conformity  with  the  principles  and  policy  of  their  oppressor. 
The  provision  in  their  charter,  that  the  laws  to  be  enacted  by 
them  should  not  be  repugnant  to  the  jurisprudence  of  England, 
could  never  be  understood  to  enjoin  any  thing  farther  than  a 
general  conformity  with  the  legislation  of  the  parent  state,  suit 
able  to  the  acknowledged  dependence  of  the  colony  on  the 
main  trunk  of  the  British  dominions.  The  unsuspecting  igno 
rance,  too,  that  is  imputed  to  the  king  and  his  counsellors,  ap 
pears  quite  incredible,  when  we  consider  that  the  example  of 
New  Plymouth,  where  a  bare  exemption  from  express  restric 
tions  had  been  followed  by  the  establishment  of  an  Independent 
church,  was  fresh  in  their  recollection  ;  that  they  were  avowed 
and  notorious  Puritans  who  now  applied  for  permission  to  re 
pair  to  the  land  where  that  constitution  was  established  ;  and 
above  all,  that,  in  their  application  to  the  king,  they  expressly 
desired  leave  to  withdraw  in  peace  from  the  bosom  of  a  church 
to  whose  ordinances  they  confessed  that  they  could  not  con 
scientiously  conform.1  Whether  the  king  and  Laud  were  or 
were  not  aware  of  the  intentions  of  the  Puritans,  they  must 
surely  be  regarded  as  the  best  judges  of  the  extent  of  conces 
sion  which  they  themselves  intended  to  convey  ;  and  by  their 
acquiescence  in  the  constitution  which  the  planters  of  Massa 
chusetts  Bay  forthwith  established,  they  ratified  a  practical  in 
terpretation  of  the  charter  in  conformity  with  the  views  of  the 
Puritans,  and  confessed  that  this  proceeding  imported  no  vio 
lation  either  of  general  law  or  particular  paction.  When  they 
afterwards  became  sensible  that  the  progress  of  Puritan  estab 
lishments  in  New  England  increased  the  ferment  which  their 
own  measures  were  creating  in  the  parent  state,  they  inter 
posed  to  check  the  intercourse  between  the  two  countries  ; 
but  yet  tacitly  acknowledged  that  the  intolerant  system  which 
they  pursued  in  England  was  excluded  by  understood  compact 
from  the  colonial  territory. 

Soon  after  the  power  of  the  adventurers  to  establish  a  colony 
was  rendered  complete  by  the  royal  charter  [1st  May,  1629], 

1  Mather. 


CHAP.  I.]  SECOND  EMIGRATION  TO  SALEM.  213 

they  equipped  and  despatched  five  ships  for  New  England, 
containing  three  hundred  and  fifty  emigrants,  chiefly  zealous 
Puritans,  accompanied  by  some  eminent  Non-conformist  min 
isters.  The  regrets  which  an  eternal  farewell  to  their  native 
land  was  calculated  to  inspire,  the  distressing  inconvenience 
of  a  long  voyage  to  persons  unaccustomed  to  the  sea,  and 
the  formidable  scene  of  toil  and  danger  that  confronted  them 
in  the  barbarous  land  where  so  many  preceding  emigrants  had 
found  an  untimely  grave,  seem  to  have  vanished  entirely  from 
the  minds  of  these  men,  supported  by  the  worth  and  dignity 
of  the  design  which  they  were  combined  to  accomplish.  Their 
hearts  were  knit  to  each  other  by  community  of  generous  pur 
pose  ;  and  they  experienced  none  of  those  jealousies  which 
invariably  spring  up  in  confederacies  for  ends  merely  selfish, 
among  persons  unequally  qualified  to  promote  the  object  of 
their  association.  Behind  them,  indeed,  was  the  land  of  their 
fathers  ; l  but  it  had  long  ceased  to  wear  towards  them  a 
benign  or  paternal  countenance  ;  and  in  forsaking  it  they  fled 
from  the  prisons  and  scaffolds  to  which  Christians  and  patriots 
were  daily  consigned.  Before  them  lay  a  vast  and  dreary 
wilderness  ;  but  they  hoped  to  irradiate  its  gloom  by  kindling 
and  preserving  there  the  sacred  fire  of  religion  and  liberty, 
which  regal  and  pontifical  tyranny  was  striving  to  extinguish 
in  the  shrines  of  England,  whence  they  carried  its  embers.8 
They  confidently  believed  that  the  religious  and  political  tenets 
which  had  languished  under  a  protracted  persecution  in  Europe 
would  now,  at  length,  shine  forth  in  their  full  lustre  in  Ameri 
ca.  Establishing  an  asylum  where  the  professors  of  these  doc 
trines  might  at  all  times  find  shelter,  they  justly  expected  to 

1  Francis  Higginson,  one  of  the  most  able,  devout,  and  popular  ministers  in 
England,  was  a  passenger  in  this  fleet.  When  he  perceived  that  he  was 
taking  his  last  look  of  the  English  coast,  he  summoned  his  children  and  the 
other  passengers  to  the  deck  of  the  vessel,  and  said  to  them,  "  We  will  not 
say,  as  the  separatists  were  wont  to  say  at  their  leaving  of  England,  '  Farewell, 
Babylon  !  Farewell,  Rome  !  '  But  we  will  say,  Farewell,  dear  England  ! 
Farewell,  the  church  of  God  in  England,  and  all  Christian  friends  there  !  We 
separate  not  from  the  church  of  England,  but  from  its  corruptions.  We  go  to 
practise  the  positive  part  of  church  reformation,  and  propagate  the  gospel  in 
America." 

3  Even  the  pious  George  Herbert,  though  devotedly  attached  to  royalty 
and  the  church  of  England,  thus  expressed  himself  at  this  period  in  his  Tem 
ple  of  Sacred  Poems :  — 

"  Religion  stands  a-tiptoe  in  our  land, 
Ready  to  pass  to  the  American  strand." 


214  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

derive  continual  accessions  to  the  vigor  of  their  own  principles 
from  the  fresh  arrival  of  succeeding  emigrants,  willing,  like 
them,  to  transplant  their  uprooted  patriotic  affection  to  a  soil 
where  it  might  flourish  in  alliance  with  the  cultivation  and  en 
joyment  of  truth  and  liberty.  They  did  not  postpone  the  prac 
tice  of  piety  till  the  conclusion  of  their  voyage  ;  but,  occu 
pied  continually  with  the  exercises  of  devotion,  they  caused 
the  ocean  which  they  traversed  to  resound  with  unwonted  ac 
claim  of  praise  and  thanksgiving  to  its  Creator.  The  seamen, 
catching  their  spirit,  readily  joined  in  all  their  religious  exer 
cises  and  ordinances,  and  expressed  their  belief  that  they  had 
practised  the  first  voluntary  sea-fasts  that  had  ever  been  per 
formed  in  the  world.  After  a  prosperous  voyage,  the  emi 
grants  had  the  satisfaction  of  reuniting  themselves  to  their 
friends  already  established  at  Salem  under  John  Endicott,  who 
had  been  appointed  deputy-governor  of  the  colony.1  [June  24, 
1629.] 

To  the  assemblage  of  men  thus  collected  the  formation  of 
a  church  appeared  the  most  interesting  of  all  their  concerns, 
and  it  occupied,  accordingly,  their  earliest  and  earnest  delib 
eration.  They  had  been  advised  to  discuss  and  settle,  before 
their  departure  from  England,  the  form  of  church  government 
which  was  to  be  established  in  the  colony  ;  but,  neglecting 
this  advice,  they  had  proceeded  no  farther  than  to  express 
their  general  assent  to  the  principle,  that  the  reformation  of  the 
church  was  to  be  attempted  according  to  the  written  word  of 
God.  They  now  applied  to  their  brethren  at  New  Plymouth, 
and  desired  to  be  acquainted  with  the  grounds  of  the  constitu 
tion  which  was  there  adopted  ;  and,  having  heard  these  fully 
explained,  and  devoted  some  time  to  a  diligent  comparison  of 
the  model  with  the  warrants  of  Scripture  which  were  cited 
in  its  vindication,  and  earnestly  besought  the  enlightening  aid 
of  that  Being  who  alone  can  teach  his  creatures  how  to  worship 
him  in  an  acceptable  manner,  they  declared  their  entire  appro 
bation  of  the  sister  church,  and  closely  copied  her  structure  in 
the  composition  of  their  own.  [Aug.  6,  1629.]  They  united 
together  in  religious  society  by  a  covenant,  in  which,  after  a 

1  Mather.     Neal.     Eliot's  New  England  Biography.     Walton's  Life  of  Her 
bert. 


CHAP.  I.]          CHURCH  AT  SALEM.  215 

solemn  dedication  of  themselves  to  live  in  the  fear  of  God,  and 
practise  a  strict  conformity  to  his  will,  so  far  as  he  should  be 
pleased  to  reveal  it  to  them,  they  engaged  to  each  other  to 
cultivate  watchfulness  and  tenderness  in  their  mutual  inter 
course  ;  to  repress  jealousies,  suspicions,  and  secret  emotions 
of  spleen  ;  and,  in  all  cases  of  offence,  to  suffer,  forbear,  and 
forgive,  after  the  example  of  their  divine  pattern.  They  prom 
ised  in  the  congregation  to  restrain  the  indulgence  of  a  vain 
glorious  forwardness  to  display  their  gifts  ;  and  in  their  inter 
course,  whether  with  sister  churches  or  with  the  mass  of  man 
kind,  to  study  a  conversation  remote  from  offence  and  from 
every  appearance  of  evil.  They  engaged,  by  a  dutiful  obe 
dience  to  all  who  should  be  set  over  them  in  church  or  com 
monwealth,  to  encourage  them  to  a  faithful  discharge  of  their 
functions  ;  and  they  expressed  their  resolution  to  approve  them 
selves,  in  their  particular  callings,  the  stewards  and  servants 
of  God  ;  shunning  idleness  as  the  bane  of  every  community, 
and  dealing  hardly  or  oppressively  with  none  of  the  human 
race.  The  system  of  ecclesiastical  policy  and  discipline  which 
they  adopted  was  that  which  distinguished  the  churches  of  the 
Independents,  and  which  we  have  already  had  occasion  to  con 
sider.  The  form  of  public  worship  which  they  instituted  re 
jected  a  liturgy  and  every  superfluous  ceremony,  and  was 
adapted  to  the  strictest  standard  of  Calvinistic  simplicity. 
They  elected  a  pastor,  a  teacher,  and  an  elder,  whom  they 
consecrated  to  their  respective  offices  by  imposition  of  the 
hands  of  the  brethren.  All  who  were  on  that  occasion  ad 
mitted  members  of  the  church  signified  their  assent  to  a  con 
fession  of  faith  digested  by  their  teachers,  and  gave  an  account 
of  the  foundation  of  their  own  hopes  as  Christians  ;  and  it  was 
established  as  an  ordinance,  that  no  person  should  thereafter 
be  permitted  to  subscribe  the  covenant,  or  be  received  into 
communion  with  the  church,  until  he  had  satisfied  the  elders 
with  respect  to  the  soundness  of  his  faith  and  the  purity  of  his 
conduct.1 

The  constitution,  of  which  we  have  now  beheld  an  abstract, 
and  especially  the  covenant  or  social  engagement  so  fraught 

1  Mather.    Neal. 


216  HISTORY  OF    NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

with  sentiments  of  exalted  piety  and  genuine  benevolence,  has 
excited  the  derision  of  some  writers,  who  refuse  to  regard  the 
speculative  liberality  which  it  indicates  in  any  other  point  of 
view  than  as  contrasted  with  the  practical  intolerance  which 
the  framers  of  it  soon  after  displayed.  But  however  agreeable 
this  aspect  may  be  to  eyes  that  watch  for  the  follies  and  frail 
ties  of  the  wise  and  good,  it  is  not  the  only  light  in  which  the 
transaction  we  have  now  considered  will  present  itself  to  hu 
mane  and  liberal  minds.  Philosophy  admits  that  the  human 
soul  is  enlarged  and  ennobled  by  the  mere  purpose  of  excel 
lence  ;  and  religion  has  pronounced  that  even  those  designs 
which  men  are  not  able  or  worthy  to  accomplish  may  bene 
ficially  affect  the  minds  that  have  sincerely  entertained  them. 
The  error  of  the  inhabitants  of  Salem  was  a  universal  trait  and 
feature  of  the  era  to  which  they  belonged  ;  the  virtues  they 
demonstrated  were  peculiar  to  themselves  and  their  Puritan 
brethren. 

In  the  ecclesiastical  constitution  which  they  established,  and 
the  sentiments  and  purposes  which  they  declaratively  interwove 
with  it,  they  rendered  a  sincere  and  laudable  homage  to  the 
rights  of  conscience  and  the  requirements  of  piety  ;  and  these 
principles,  no  doubt,  exercised  a  beneficial  influence  on  the 
practice,  which,  unhappily,  they  did  not  entirely  control.  The 
influence  of  principles  that  tend  to  the  restraint  of  human  fe 
rocity  and  intolerance  is  frequently  invisible  to  mortal  eyes,  be 
cause  it  is  productive  chiefly  of  negative  consequences  ;  and 
when  great  provocation  or  alarm  has  prompted  the  professors 
of  those  principles  to  violate  the  relative  restraint,  they  will  be 
judged  with  little  candor,  if  charity  neglect  to  supply  the  im 
perfection  of  that  knowledge  to  which  we  are  limited  by  the 
narrow  and  partial  range  of  our  view,  and  to  suggest  the  secret 
and  difficult  forbearance  which  may  have  preceded  the  visible 
action  which  we  condemn  or  deplore.  In  the  very  first  in 
stance  of  intolerant  proceeding  with  which  the  adversaries  of 
the  Puritans  have  reproached  this  American  community,  the 
influence  of  genuine  piety  in  mitigating  human  impatience  was 
strikingly  apparent.  It  is  a  notable  fact,  that,  although  these 
emigrants  were  collected  from  a  body  of  men  embracing  such 
diversity  of  opinion  respecting  church  government  and  the  rites 


CHAP.  I.]  JOHN  AND  SAMUEL  BROWN.  217 

of  worship  as  then  prevailed  among  the  Puritans  of  England, 
and  though  they  had  landed  in  America  *  without  having  pre 
viously  ascertained  how  far  they  were  likely  to  agree  on  this 
very  point,  for  the  sake  of  which  they  incurred  banishment 
from  their  native  country,  the  constitution  which  was  copied 
from  the  church  of  New  Plymouth  gave  satisfaction  to  almost 
every  individual  among  them. 

Two  brothers,  however,  of  the  name  of  Brown,  one  a 
lawyer,  and  the  other  a  merchant,  both  of  them  men  of  note 
and  among  the  number  of  the  original  patentees,  dissented  from 
this  constitution,  and  arguing,  with  great  absurdity,  that  all  who 
adhered  to  it  would  infallibly  become  Anabaptists,  endeavoured 
to  procure  converts  to  their  opinion,  and  to  establish  a  sep 
arate  congregation,  on  a  model  more  approximated  to  the 
forms  of  the  church  of  England.  The  defectiveness  of  their 
argument  was  supplied  by  the  vehemence  of  their  clamor  ; 
and  they  obtained  a  favorable  audience  from  a  few  persons  who 
regarded  with  unfriendly  eye  the  discipline  which  the  provincial 
church  was  disposed  to  exercise  upon  offenders  against  the 
rules  of  morality.  Endicott,  the  governor,  called  those  men, 
together  with  the  ministers,  before  a  general  assembly  of  the 
people,  who,  after  hearing  both  parties,  repeated  their  appro 
bation  of  the  system  that  had  been  established  ;  and,  as  the  two 
brothers  still  persisted  in  their  attempts  to  create  a  schism  in 
the  church,  and  even  endeavoured  to  excite  a  mutiny  against 
the  government,  they  were  declared  unfit  to  remain  in  the 
colony,  and  compelled  to  reembark  and  depart  in  the  vessels 
in  which  they  had  accompanied  the  other  emigrants  in  the 
voyage  from  England.1  Their  departure  restored  harmony  to 
the  colonists,  who  were  endeavouring  to  complete  their  settle 
ment  and  extend  their  occupation  of  the  country,  when  they 
were  interrupted  by  the  approach  of  winter,  and  the  ravages  of 
disease,  which  quickly  deprived  them  of  nearly  one  half  of  their 
number,  but  produced  no  other  change  on  their  minds  than  to 

1  Mather.  Neal.  On  their  return  to  England,  they  preferred  a  complaint 
against  the  colonists  of  oppressive  demeanour  to  themselves  and  enmity  to  the 
church  of  England.  The  total  disregard  which  their  complaint  experienced 
(Chalmers)  strongly  confirms  the  opinion  I  have  expressed  of  the  under 
standing  of  all  parties  with  regard  to  the  real  import  of  the  charter. 
VOL.  I.  28  I 


HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

cause  the  sentiments  of  hope  and  fear  to  converge  more  stead 
ily  to  the  Author  of  their  existence. 

Notwithstanding  the  censure  with  which  some  writers  have 
commented  on  the  banishment  of  the  two  individuals  whose 
case  we  have  remarked,  the  justice  of  the  proceeding  must 
commend  itself  to  the  sentiments  of  all  impartial  men  ;  nor 
would  it  have  been  necessary  to  advert  to  the  charge  of  intol 
erance  to  which  the  colonists  have  been  exposed,  if  their  con 
duct  had  never  given  juster  occasion  to  it.  But,  unfortunately, 
a  great  proportion  of  the  Puritans  at  this  period  were  deeply 
infected  with  the  prevalent  error  of  their  age,1  and  regarded  as 
impossible  the  peaceable  coexistence  of  different  sects  in  the 
same  community,  —  a  notion  strongly  confirmed,  if  not  orig 
inally  suggested  to  them,  by  the  treatment  which  they  received 
from  their  adversaries.  If  it  was  reasonably  incumbent  on  men, 
who  were  themselves  the  victims  of  persecution,  to  abstain 
from  what  their  own  experience  had  feelingly  shown  them  to 
be  hateful  and  odious,  it  was  natural  that  these  men,  flying  to 
deserts  for  the  sake  of  particular  practices  and  opinions,  should 
desire  and  expect  to  see  the  objects  of  their  painful  sacrifice 
flourish  unmolested  and  undisputed  in  the  scene  of  their  retire 
ment.  The  sufferings  they  had  endured  from  their  adversaries 
they  considered  as  the  legitimate  consequence  of  the  pernicious 
errors  that  these  adversaries  had  imbibed  ;  and  they  customa 
rily  regarded  their  opponents  as  the  enemies  of  their  persons, 
as  well  as  persecutors  of  their  tenets.  The  activity  of  govern 
ment  in  support  of  a  system  of  religious  doctrines  they  were 
far  from  condemning  in  the  abstract.  They  admitted  the  pro- 

1  The  richest  endowment  of  reason  could  not  exempt  the  most  distinguished 
of  modern  philosophers  from  intolerance  ;  nor  could  the  experience  of  perse 
cution  always  demonstrate  its  injustice  even  to  its  own  victims.  Lord  Bacon 
considered  that  uniformity  in  religious  sentiment  and  worship  was  essential  to 
the  support  of  government,  and  that  no  toleration  could  with  safety  be  granted 
to  sectaries.  Bacon,  De  Unitate  Ecdesice.  During  the  administration  of  Crom 
well,  a  Presbyterian  minister,  who  had  himself  felt  the  rod  of  persecution, 
published  a  treatise  against  what  he  was  pleased  to  term  "this  cursed  intoler 
able  toleration."  Orme's  Life  of  Owen. 

To  the  objection,  that  persecution  tends  to  make  men  hypocrites,  an  eminent 
minister  in  New  England  answered,  "  Better  tolerate  hypocrites  and  tares, 
than  briers  and  thorns."  Another,  in  a  work  published  in  1645,  thus  ex 
presses  himself:  "  It  is  said  that  men  ought  to  have  liberty  of  conscience,  and 
that  it  is  persecution  to  debar  them  of  it.  I  can  rather  stand  amazed  than  re 
ply  to  this.  It  is  an  astonishment  that  the  brains  of  men  should  be  parboiled 
in  such  impious  ignorance."  —  Bolknap's  History  of  New  Hampshire. 


CHAP.  I.]     INTOLERANCE  OF  THE  SETTLERS.      219 

priety  of  such  interposition,  and  condemned  it  only  when  it 
seemed  to  them  erroneously  directed.  Even  when  oppressed 
themselves,  they  exclaimed  against  indiscriminate  toleration. 
They  contradicted  so  far  their  own  principles  ;  and  maintained 
that  human  beings  might  and  ought  to  punish  what  God  alone 
could  correct  and  alter.  Some  of  them,  it  is  true,  had  already 
anticipated  the  sentiments  by  which  at  a  later  period  the  Inde 
pendents  were  generally  characterized,  and  which  induced  them 
to  reject  all  connection  between  church  and  state,  and  disallow 
the  competence  of  interposing  magisterial  authority  to  sustain 
one  church  or  to  suppress  or  discourage  another. 

But  very  opposite  sentiments  prevailed  among  the  bulk  of 
the  colonists  of  Massachusetts,  who  came  to  America  fresh 
from  the  influence  of  persecution,  and  had  not,  like  their  breth 
ren  at  New  Plymouth,  the  advantage  of  an  intermediate  resi 
dence  in  a  land  where  (to  a  certain  extent,  at  least1)  a  peace 
ful  coexistence  of  different  sects  was  demonstrated  to  be  not 
merely  practicable,  but  signally  promotive  of  the  most  excel 
lent  graces  of  Christian  character.  Much  might  be  urged,  and 
will  doubtless  suggest  itself  to  every  liberal  mind,  in  extenua 
tion  of  their  error,  of  which  the  bitter  leaven  continued  long  to 
disturb  their  peace  and  felicity.  But  indulgence  must  not  be 
confounded  with  approval  ;  and  the  considerations  which  may 
be  allowed  to  mitigate  our  censure  of  the  intolerant  spirit 
which  these  people  displayed  can  never  entitle  this  spirit  to 
the  commendation  of  virtue.  It  was  sharpened  by  the  copious 
infusions  which  the  colony  received  of  the  feelings  excited  in 
England  by  the  increased  severity  of  persecution,  from  which 
the  victims  began  to  fly  in  increasing  numbers  to  America. 

The  British  empire  in  America  underwent,  about  this  period, 
some  vicissitudes,  which  in  after  years  affected  materially  the 
prosperity  both  of  New  England  and  of  the  other  colonial  estab 
lishments  in  the  same  quarter  of  the  world.  The  war  which 
the  king  so  wantonly  declared  against  France  in  1627,  and 
which  produced  only  disgrace  and  disaster  to  his  arms  in  Eu 
rope,  was  attended  with  events  of  a  very  different  complexion 

1  It  was  not  till  the  year  1619  (the  year  preceding  the  departure  of  the 
Plymouth  settlers  from  Leyden),  that  the  sanguinary  persecution  of  the  Ar- 
minians,  to  which  I  have  already  alluded,  occurred  in  Holland. 


220  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

in  America.  Sir  David  Kirk,  having  obtained  a  commission 
to  attack  the  American  dominions  of  France,  invaded  Canada 
in  the  summer  of  1628  ;  and  so  successful  was  the  enterprise, 
that  in  July,  1629,  Quebec  was  reduced  to  surrender  to  the 
arms  of  England.  Thus  was  the  capital  of  New  France  sub 
dued  by  the  English,  about  one  hundred  and  thirty  years  be 
fore  they  achieved  its  final  conquest  by  the  sword  of  Wolfe. 
But  the  important  tidings  had  not  been  received  in  Europe 
when  peace  was  reestablished  between  France  and  England  ; 
and  Charles,  by  the  subsequent  treaty  of  St.  Germain,  not  only 
restored  this  valuable  acquisition  to  France,  but  expressed  the 
cession  in  terms  of  such  extensive  application,  as  undeniably 
inferred  a  recognition  of  the  French,  and  a  surrender  of  the 
British  claims  to  the  province  of  Nova  Scotia.1  This  arrange 
ment  portended  vexation  and  injury  to  the  settlements  of  the 
English  ;  and  the  sequel  of  our  narrative  will  demonstrate  how 
fully  the  sinister  portent  was  accomplished. 

1  Champlain's  Voyage.  Oldmixon.  Chalmers.  "  It  is  remarkable,"  says 
Professor  Kalm,  "  that  the  French  were  doubtful  whether  they  should  reclaim 
Canada  from  the  English,  or  leave  it  to  them.  Many  were  of  opinion  that  it 
was  better  to  keep  the  people  in  France,  and  employ  them  in  all  sorts  of  manu 
factures,  which  would  obfige  the  other  European  powers  who  had  colonies  in 
America  to  brine  their  raw  goods  to  French  ports,  and  take  French  manufac 
tures  in  return.'  But  the  prevalent  opinion  was,  that  the  reclamation  and 
retention  of  Canada  would  promote  the  naval  power  of  France,  and  was 
necessary  to  counterbalance  tne  rising  colonial  empire  of  England.  —  Kalm's 
Travels  in  North  America. 


CHAP.  II.]    TRANSFER  OF  MASSACHUSETTS  CHARTER.      221 


CHAPTER    II. 

The  Charter  Government  transferred  from  England  to  Massachusetts.  —  Nu 
merous  Emigration. — Foundation  of  Boston.  —  Hardships  endured  by  the 
new  Settlers.  —  Disfranchisement  of  Dissenters  in  the  Colony.  —  Influence 
of  the  provincial  Clergy.  —  John  Cotton  and  his  Colleagues  and  Successors. 

—  Williams's  Schism  —  he  founds  Providence.  —  Representative  Assembly 
established  in  Massachusetts.  —  Arrival  of  Hugh  Peters  —  and  Henry  Vane, 
who  is  elected  Governor.  —  Foundation  of  Connecticut  —  and  New  Haven. 

—  War  with  the  Pequod  Indians.  —  Severities  exercised  by  the  victorious 
Colonists.  —  Disturbances  created  by  Mrs.  Hutchinson.  —  Colonization  of 
Rhode  Island  —  and  of  New  Hampshire  and  Maine.  —  Jealousy  and  fluc 
tuating  Conduct  of  the  King.  —  Measures  adopted  against  the  Liberties  of 
Massachusetts  —  interrupted  by  the  Civil  Wars,  —  State  of  New  England  — 
Population  —  Laws  —  Manners. 

THE  directors  of  the  New  England  Company  in  Britain  now 
exerted  the  utmost  diligence  to  reinforce  the  colony  they  had 
founded  with  a  numerous  body  of  additional  settlers.  [1629.] 
Their  designs  were  promoted  by  the  rigor  and  intolerance  of 
Laud's  administration,  which  progressively  multiplying  the  hard 
ships  imposed  on  all  Englishmen  who  scrupled  entire  confor 
mity  to  his  ecclesiastical  ordinances,  proportionably  diminished, 
in  their  estimation,  the  danger  and  hardships  attending  a  re 
moval  to  America.  Many  people  began  to  treat  with  the  com 
pany  for  a  settlement  in  New  England  ;  and  several  of  those 
new  adventurers  were  persons  of  distinguished  family  and  opu 
lent  estate.  But  foreseeing  the  misrule  inseparable  from  the 
residence  of  the  legislative  authority  in  Britain,  they  demanded, 
as  a  previous  condition  of  their  emigration,  that  the  chartered 
rights  and  all  the  powers  of  government  should  be  transferred 
to  New  England,  and  exercised  within  the  territory  of  the 
colony.  The  directors  of  the  company,  who  had  incurred  a 
considerable  expense,  with  little  prospect  of  speedy  remunera 
tion,  were  willing  to  secure  the  settlement  of  so  many  wealthy 
and  respectable  colonists  in  their  domains,  even  at  the  expense 
of  the  surrender  that  was  demanded  from  them  ;  but,  doubting 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

its  legality,  they  thought  proper  to  consult  lawyers  of  eminence 
on  the  subject.  Unaccountable  as  it  must  appear  to  every 
person  in  the  slightest  degree  conversant  with  legal  considera 
tions,  the  lawyers  who  were  consulted  declared  an  opinion 
favorable  to  the  wishes  of  the  emigrants  ;  and  accordingly  it 
was  determined,  by  general  consent,  "  that  the  charter  should 
be  transferred,  and  the  government  be  settled  in  New  Eng 
land."  [29th  Aug.,  1629.]  To  the  existing  members  of  the 
corporation  who  should  still  remain  in  Britain  was  reserved  a 
share  in  the  trade,  stock,  and  profits  of  the  company,  for  the 
term  of  seven  years.1  By  this  transaction,  —  one  of  the  most 
singular  that  is  recorded  in  the  history  of  a  civilized  people, — 
were  the  municipal  rights  and  liberties  of  the  inhabitants  of 
New  England  established  on  a  firm  and  respectable  basis. 

When  we  consider  the  means  by  which  this  was  accom 
plished,  we  find  ourselves  beset  with  doubts  and  difficulties,  of 
which  the  only  rational  solution  that  presents  itself  is  the  sup 
position  we  have  already  adopted,  that  the  king  was  at  this 
time  exceedingly  desirous  to  rid  the  realm  of  the  Puritans, 
and  had  unequivocally  signified  to  them,  that,  if  they  would 
withdraw  to  some  other  part  of  his  dominions,  and  employ 
their  energies  in  subduing  the  deserts  of  America,  instead  of 
disturbing  his  operations  in  England,  they  should  have  permis 
sion  to  arrange  the  structure,  civil  and  ecclesiastical,  of  their 
provincial  commonwealth,  according  to  their  own  discretion. 
An  English  corporation,  appointed  by  its  charter  to  reside  in 
London,  resolved  itself,  by  its  own  act,  into  an  American  cor 
poration,  and  transferred  its  residence  to  Massachusetts  ;  and 
this  was  openly  transacted  by  men  whose  principles  rendered 
them  peculiarly  obnoxious  to  their  rulers,  and  under  the  eyes 
of  a  prince  no  less  vigilant  to  mark,  than  prompt  to  repress, 
every  encroachment  on  the  limits  of  his  prerogative.  So  far 
was  Charles  from  entertaining  the  slightest  dissatisfaction  at 
this  proceeding,  or  from  desiring,  at  the  present  period  of  his 
reign,  to  obstruct  the  removal  of  the  Puritans  to  New  England, 
that  about  two  years  after  this  signal  change  was  carried  into 
effect,  when  a  complaint  of  arbitrary  and  illegal  measures  was 

1  Mather.    Hutchinson. 


CHAP.  II.]     DEMONSTRATIONS  OF  ROYAL   FAVOR.  223 

preferred  against  the  colony  by  a  Roman  Catholic  who  had 
been  banished  from  it,  and  who  was  supported  by  Sir  Ferdi- 
nando  Gorges,  —  the  king,  after  a  deliberate  examination  of  the 
case  in  the  privy  council,  issued  a  proclamation  not  only  jus 
tifying  but  commending  the  whole  conduct  of  the  provincial 
government,  reprobating  the  prevalent  reports  that  he  "  had 
no  good  opinion  of  that  plantation,"  and  engaging  not  only  to 
maintain  the  privileges  of  its  inhabitants,  but  to  supply  what 
ever  else  might  contribute  to  their  farther  comfort  and  pros 
perity.1 

From  the  terms  of  this  document  (of  which  no  notice  is 
taken  by  the  writers  inimical  to  the  Puritans),  and  from  the 
whole  complexion  of  the  king's  conduct  towards  the  founders 
of  this  settlement,  it  would  appear,  that)  whatever  designs  he 
might  secretly  cherish  of  adding  the  subjugation  of  New  Eng 
land,  at  a  future  period,  to  that  of  his  British  and  Virginian 
dominions,  his  policy  at  the  present  time  was,  to  persuade  the 
leaders  of  the  Puritans,  that,  if  they  would  peaceably  abandon 
the  contest  for  their  principles  in  England,  they  were  at  liberty 
to  embody  and  enjoy  them  in  whatever  institutions  they  might 
think  fit  to  establish  in  America.  And  yet  some  writers  2  — 
whom  it  is  impossible  to  tax  with  ignorance,  as  they  had  ac 
cess  to  all  the  existing  materials  of  information, — whom  it 
might  justly  be  reckoned  presumptuous  to  charge  with  defect 
of  discernment,  — =-  and  whom  it  may,  perhaps,  appear  unchari 
table  to  reproach  with  malignity  towards  the  Puritans  —  have 
not  scrupled  to  accuse  the  founders  of  this  colony  of  pursuing 
their  purposes  by  a  policy  not  less  impudent  than  fraudful,  and 
by  acts  of  disobedience  little  short  of  rebellion.  The  colonists 
themselves,  notwithstanding  all  the  facilities  which  the  king 
presented  to  them,  and  the  unwonted  liberality  and  considera 
tion  with  which  he  showed  himself  willing  to  grace  their  de 
parture  from  Britain,  were  so  fully  persuaded  of  his  rooted 
enmity  to  their  principles,  and  so  little  able  to  reconcile  his 
present  demeanour  with  his  favorite  policy,  that  they  openly 
declared  they  had  been  conducted  by  Providence  to  a  land  of 
rest,  through  ways  which  they  were  contented  to  admire  with- 

1  Neal.  *  Chalmers.    Robertson. 


224  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

out  comprehending  ;  and  that  they  could  ascribe  the  blessings 
they  obtained  to  nothing  else  than  the  special  interposition  of 
that  Being  who  orders  all  the  steps  of  his  people,  and  holds 
the  hearts  of  kings,  as  of  all  men,  in  his  hands.  It  is,  indeed, 
a  strange  coincidence,  that  this  arbitrary  prince,  at  the  very 
time  when  he  was  oppressing  the  royalists  in  Virginia,  should 
have  been  cherishing  the  principles  of  liberty  among  the  Puri 
tans  in  New  England. 

Having  achieved  this  important  innovation  in  the  structure 
of  their  political  system,  the  adventurers  proceeded  with  equal 
prudence  and  vigor  to  execute  the  ulterior  designs  which  they 
had  undertaken.  By  a  general  court  of  assembly,  John  Win- 
throp  was  appointed  governor,  and  Thomas  Dudley  deputy- 
governor  ;  eighteen  counsellors,  or  assistants,  were  also  chosen ; 
and  in  these  functionaries,  together  with  the  whole  body  of 
freemen  residing  in  New  England,  were  vested  all  the  corpo 
rate  rights  of  the  company  i  So  active  was  the  spirit  of  emi 
gration,  that,  in  the  course  of  the  ensuing  year  [1630],  above 
fifteen  hundred  settlers,  among  whom  were  several  wealthy 
and  high-born  persons,  both  men  and  women,  who  expressed 
their  determination  to  follow  truth  and  liberty  into  a  desert, 
rather  than  to  enjoy  all  the  pleasures  of  the  world  under  the 
dominion  of  superstition  and  slavery,  set  sail  from  Britain 
aboard  a  fleet  of  seventeen  ships  for  New  England.  [July  6.] 
Among  them  there  came  Nathaniel  Rogers  (and  his  family) ,  a 
clergyman  of  Ipswich,  in  Suffolk  ;  the  lineal  descendant  of  that 
excellent  Rogers,  who,  burned  at  Smithfield  under  Mary's  reign, 
attained  the  highest  fame  in  English  martyrology.  On  their 
arrival  at  Salem,  many  of  them  were  so  displeased  with  its 
local  circumstances,  that  they  explored  the  country  in  quest  of 
more  agreeable  stations  ;  and,  settling  in  various  places  around 
the  adjacent  bay,  according  to  their  particular  predilections, 
laid  the  foundation  of  Boston,  Charlestown,  Dorchester,  Rox- 
bury,  and  other  societies,  which  have  since  expanded  into  con 
siderable  towns.  In  each  of  these  settlements,  a  church  was 
established  on  the  same  model  with  that  of  Salem.  This 
concernment,  together  with  the  care  of  providing  for  their 
subsistence  during  winter,  afforded  ample  occupation  to  the 


CHAP.  II.]     MORTALITY  AMONG  THE  NEW  SETTLERS.      225 

emigrants  for  several  months  after  their  arrival.  The  approach 
of  winter  was  attended  with  a  repetition  of  those  trials  and 
distresses,  through  the  ordeal  of  which  every  band  of  European 
settlers  in  New  England  was  long  fated  to  pass.  Afflicted 
with  severe  scarcity,  which  all  the  generous  contributions  of 
the  other  settlements  in  the  province  could  but  slightly  allevi 
ate,  —  attacked  with  various  distempers,  the  consequence  of 
hunger,  cold,  and  the  peculiarities  of  a  soil  and  climate  uncon 
genial  to  constitutions  formed  in  Europe,  —  and  lodged  for  the 
most  part  in  booths  and  tents  that  afforded  but  imperfect  pro 
tection  from  the  weather, — great  numbers  of  the  new  colo 
nists  were  speedily  carried  to  the  grave.  "  Many,"  says 
Cotton  Mather,  "  merely  took  New  England  in  their  way  to 
heaven."  But  the  noble  determination  of  spirit  which  had 
impelled  them  to  emigrate  preserved  all  its  force  ;  the  surviv 
ors  endured  their  calamities  with  unshaken  fortitude  ;  and  the 
dying  expressed  a  grateful  exultation  in  the  consciousness  of 
having  promoted  and  beheld  the  foundation  of  a  Christian 
church  in  this  desolate  and  benighted  quarter  of  the  earth. 
The  continuance  of  deadly  disease  enforced  the  devout  sup 
plications  of  the  colonists  ;  and  its  cessation,  which  they  re 
cognized  as  the  answer  to  their  prayers,  excited  their  pious 
gratitude.  This  calamity  was  hardly  removed,  when  they  were 
alarmed  by  the  tidings  of  a  conspiracy  of  the  neighbouring  In 
dians  for  their  destruction.  The  colonists,  instead  of  relying 
on  their  patent  from  the  British  crown,  had,  on  their  first  arriv 
al,  fairly  purchased  from  the  Indians  all  the  tracts  of  land 
which  they  proposed  to  occupy;  and  in  the  hour  of  their  peril, 
both  they  and  the  faithless  vendors  who  menaced  them  reaped 
the  fruit  of  their  compliance  or  collision  with  the  designs  of 
Eternal  Justice.  The  hostility  of  the  savages  was  interrupted 
by  a  pestilential  distemper,  that  broke  out  among  them,  and 
with  rapid  desolation  swept  whole  tribes  away.  This  distem 
per  was  the  small-pox,  which  has  always  proved  a  much  more 
formidable  malady  to  Indian  than  to  European  constitutions. 
In  spite  of  the  most  charitable  exertions  on  the  part  of  the 
colonists  to  arrest  the  progress  of  the  malady  by  their  superior 
medical  skill,  nine  tenths  of  the  neighbouring  Indians  were  cut 
VOL.  i.  29 


226  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

off;  and  many  of  the  survivors,  flying  from  the  infection,  re 
moved  their  habitations  to  more  distant  regions.1 

When  the  departure  of  winter  and  the  arrival  of  supplies 
from  England  [1631]  permitted  the  colonists  to  resume  their 
assemblies  for  the  transaction  of  public  business,  their  very 
first  proceedings  demonstrated  that  a  great  majority  of  them 
were  strongly  imbued  with  a  spirit  of  intolerance,  and  were 
determined  that  their  commonwealth  should  exemplify  a  thor 
ough  intertexture  and  mutual  dependence  of  church  and  state. 
A  law  was  framed,  enacting  that  no  persons  should  hereafter 
be  admitted  freemen,  or  entitled  to  any  share  in  the  govern 
ment,  or  capable  of  being  chosen  magistrates,  or  even  of  serv 
ing  as  jurymen,  but  such  as  had  been  or  should  hereafter  be 
received  members  of  one  or  other  of  the  congregations  of  the 
established  church  of  the  province.  This  law  at  once  divested 
every  person  who  did  not  hold  the  prevailing  opinions,  not 
only  on  the  fundamental  points  of  Christian  doctrine,  but  with 
respect  to  ecclesiastical  discipline  and  the  ceremonies  of  wor 
ship,  of  all  the  privileges  of  a  citizen.  An  uncontrolled  power 
of  approving  or  rejecting  the  claims  of  those  who  applied  for 
admission  into  communion  with  the  church  being  vested  in  the 
ministers  and  elders  of  each  congregation,  the  most  valuable 
civil  rights  wrere  made  to  depend  on  their  decision  with  respect 
to  qualifications  purely  ecclesiastical.  Even  at  a  later  period, 
when  the  colonists  were  compelled  by  the  remonstrances  and 
menaces  of  Charles  the  Second  to  make  some  alteration  of  this 
law,  they  altered  it  at  first  rather  in  appearance  than  in  reality, 
and  still  required  that  every  candidate  for  the  rank  of  a  freeman 
should  produce  a  certificate  from  some  minister  of  the  estab 
lished  church,  that  he  was  a  person  of  orthodox  principles  and 
of  honest  life  and  conversation, — a  certificate  which  dissenters 

1  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Peirce's  History  of  Harvard  University. 
"  The  first  planters,  far  from  using  the  barbarous  methods  practised  by  the 
Spaniards  on  the  southern  continent,  which  have  made  them  detestable  to  the 
whole  Christian  world,  sought  to  gain  the  natives  by  strict  justice  in  their 
dealings  with  them,  as  well  as  by  all  the  endearments  of  kindness  and  hu 
manity.  To  lay  an  early  foundation  for  a  firm  and  lasting  friendship,  they 
assured  the  Americans  that  they  did  not  come  among  them  as  invaders,  but 
purchasers,  and  therefore  called  an  assembly  of  them  together  to  inquire  who 
had  the  right  to  dispose  of  their  lands  ;  and  being  told  it  was  their  sachems  or 

Erinces,  they  thereupon  agreed  with  them  for  what  districts  they  bought,  pub- 
cly,  and  in  open  market." — Dummer's  Defence  of  the  New  England  Charters. 


CHAP.  II.]      DISFRANCHISEMENT  OF  DISSENTERS.  227 

from  the  established  church  solicited  with  great  disadvantage. 
The  consequence  of  such  laws  was  to  elevate  the  clergy  to  a 
very  high  degree  of  influence  and  authority  ; 1  and,  happily, 
the  colony  was  long  blessed  with  a  succession  of  ministers 
whose  disinterested  virtue  and  superior  sense  served  not  merely 
to  counteract  the  mischief  of  this  inordinate  influence,  but  even 
to  convert  it  in  some  measure  into  an  instrument  of  good. 
Though  dissenters  from  the  provincial  church  were  thus  de 
prived  of  political  privileges,  it  does  not  appear  that  they  were 
exposed  to  any  positive  molestation,  except  when  their  tenets 
were  considered  as  blasphemous,  or  when  they  endeavoured 
by  the  propagation  of  them  to  detach  other  persons  from  the 
established  system,  or  to  disturb  the  public  peace.  The  exclu 
sion  from  political  franchises  to  which  they  were  subjected 
seems  not  at  first  to  have  given  them  any  annoyance,  but  to 
have  been  recognized  as  the  necessary  operation  of  that  system 
of  policy  in  conformity  with  which  the  preservation  of  the 
church  estate  was  accounted  the  main  object  of  political  insti 
tutions  ;  and  the  chief  value  of  political  rights  was  supposed  to 
consist  in  their  subservience  to  that  object.  Various  persons 
resided  in  peace  within  the  colony,  though  excluded  from 
political  franchises  ;  and-  one  minister  in  particular,  of  the  epis 
copal  persuasion,  provoked  more  mirth  than  displeasure,  when, 
signifying  his  refusal  to  join  any  of  the  provincial  congregations, 
he  declared,  that,  as  he  had  left  England  because  he  did  not 
like  the  lords  bishops,  so  they  might  rest  assured  that  he  had 
not  come  to  Jlmerica  to  live  under  the  lords  brethren.2 

The  diminution  of  their  original  numbers  [16323],  which  the 

1  Some  instances  of  their  influence  in  matters  of  importance  will  occur  in 
the  further  progress  of  our  narrative.     An  instance  of  their  control  over  public 
opinion  on  a  point,  which,  being  quite  beyond  the  province  of  reason,  was  the 
more  likely  to  interest  the  most  obstinate  and  unassailable  prejudices,  is  men 
tioned  by  Hutchinson.     Tobacco  was  at  first  prohibited  under  a  penalty  ;  and 
in  some  writings  that  were  popular  in  the  colony,  the  smoke  of  it  was  with 
profane  absurdity  compared  to  the  fumes  of  the  bottomless  pit.     But  some  of 
the  clergy  having  fallen  into  the  practice  of  smoking,  tobacco  was  instantly, 
by  an  act  of  government,  "  set  at  liberty." 

2  Neal.     Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 

3  "  One  pleasant  thing  happened  this  year,  acted  by  the  Indians.   Mr.  Wins- 
low  coming  in  his  bark  from  Connecticut  to  Narraganset,  went  to  Ousamequin, 
the  sagamore,  his  old  ally,  who  offered  to  conduct  him  to  Plymouth.    Ousame 
quin  sent  a  man  to  Plymouth  to  say  that  Winslow  was  dead.     Being  after 
wards  asked  the  reason,  he  said  it  was  their  custom,  in  order  to  make  their 
friends  more  joyful  on  seeing  them."  —  Collections  of  the  Rhode  Island  Histori- 


228  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

colonists  underwent  from  hardship  and  disease,  was  much  more 
than  compensated  by  the  ample  reinforcements  which  they 
continually  received  from  their  persecuted  brethren  in  Eng 
land.  Among  the  new  settlers  who  arrived  not  long  after  the 
transference  of  the  seat  of  government  to  Massachusetts,  were 
some  eminent  Puritan  ministers,  of  whom  the  most  remarkable 
were  Eliot  and  Mayhew,  the  first  Protestant  missionaries  to 
the  Indians,  and  John  Cotton,  a  man  whose  singular  worth 
procured,  and  long  preserved,  to  him  a  patriarchal  repute  and 
authority  in  the  colony.  After  ministering  for  twenty  years  in 
England  to  a  congregation  by  whom  he  was  highly  respected 
and  beloved,  Cotton  was  summoned  before  the  Court  of  High 
Commission,  on  a  charge  of  neglecting  to  kneel  at  the  sacra 
ment.  Lord  Dorset  and  other  persons  of  distinction,  by  whom 
he  was  known  and  esteemed,  employed  the  strongest  interces 
sion  in  his  behalf  with  Laud  ;  but  their  exertions  were  unavail 
ing  ;  and  Dorset  was  constrained  to  inform  his  friend,  "  that, 
if  it  had  been  only  drunkenness  or  adultery  that  he  had  com 
mitted,  he  might  have  found  favor  ;  but  the  sin  of  Puritanism 
was  unpardonable."  Cotton,  in  consequence,  retired  to  New 
England,  where  he  soon  found  an  ample  solace  of  exile  in  an 
enlarged  sphere  of  usefulness  and  virtue.  To  an  earnest  con 
cern  for  the  propagation  of  religion  he  united  a  deep  and  con 
stant  personal  sense  of  its  influence  ;  and  habitually  seeking  to 
illustrate  and  adorn  by  his  life  the  doctrine  which  he  taught, 
he  promoted  its  acceptance  by  the  weight  of  his  character  and 
the  animation  of  his  example. 

The  loftiness  of  the  standard  to  which  his  constant  regard 
was  directed,  and  the  assimilating  influence  of  that  strong  ad 
miration  which  he  entertained  for  it,  communicated  to  his  char 
acter  an  elevation  that  commanded  respect  ;  while  the  con 
tinual  sense  of  his  dependence  on  divine  aid,  and  of  his  inferi 
ority  to  the  great  object  of  his  imitation,  graced  his  manners 
with  a  humility  that  attracted  love,  and  disarmed  the  conten 
tious  opposition  of  petulance  and  envy.  It  is  recorded  of  him, 
that,  having  been  once  followed  from  the  church  where  he 

cal  Society.  Even  the  wise  Ulysses  is  described  by  Homer  as  employing  a 
similar  device  with  his  father,  and  moving  the  old  man's  sorrow  to  enhance 
his  joy. 


CHAP.  II.]  JOHN  COTTON.  229 

preached  by  a  sour,  peevish  fanatic,  who  announced  to  him, 
with  a  frown,  that  his  ministry  had  become  dark  and  flat,  he 
replied,  "  Both,  brother,  —  it  may  be  both  ;  let  me  have  your 
prayers  that  it  may  be  otherwise."  On  another  occasion,  being 
accosted  in  the  street  by  a  pragmatical  disputer,  who  insolently 
called  "him  an  old  fool,  Cotton,  with  forgiving  mildness  blended 
with  a  solemnity  that  showed  him  incapable  of  contemning  the 
opinion  of  his  neighbour,  answered,  "  /  confess  I  am  so  ;  the 
Lord  make  thee  and  me  wiser  than  we  are  ;  even  wise  unto 
salvation."  l  The  character,  at  once  so  venerable  and  so  ami 
able,  of  this  excellent  clergyman,  and  of  many  of  his  col 
leagues,  seems  to  have  been  formed  by  Providence  for  the 
express  purpose  of  moderating,  by  a  happy  influence,  the  vio 
lent,  divisive,  and  controversial  spirit  that  long  continued  to 
ferment  in  a  community  of  men  whom  persecution  had  ren 
dered  rigid  and  inflexible  in  opinion,  —  whose  sentiments  had 
not  been  harmonized  by  previous  habits  of  union  and  accommo 
dation,  —  who  were  daily  receiving  into  their  body  a  fresh  in 
fusion  of  dissimilar  characters  and  exasperated  spirits,  —  and 
among  whom  each  naturally  considered  the  notions  and  prac 
tices  for  which  he  had  individually  suffered  as  the  most  im 
portant  feature  of  the  common  cause. 

When  we  recollect  the  presence  of  such  elements  of  discord, 
and  the  severe  and  protracted  operation  that  had  been  given  to 
that  influence  which  tends  to  drive  even  the  wise  to  frenzy, 
we  shall  be  less  disposed  to  marvel  at  the  vehement  heats  and 
acrimonious  contentions  which  in  some  instances  broke  forth  to 
disturb  the  peace  of  the  colony,  than  that  in  the  midst  of  those 
alarming  symptoms  so  much  coherence  and  stability  was  pre 
served,  and  so  much  virtue,  happiness,  and  prosperity  attained. 
Nor  should  it  ever  be  forgotten,  that  the  polemical  strife  that 
arose  among  the  fathers  of  New  England  was  not  the  selfish 
strife  of  ambition.  It  arose  from  their  common  attachment 
to  the  truths  of  Christianity  ;  but,  unfortunately,  to  these  truths 
partially  conceived,  and  beheld  in  different  points  of  view  by» 
different  men.  Among  the  instruments  happily  qualified  and 
providentially  employed  to  compose  and  unite  the  spirits  of  the 

1  Neal. 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

people,  were  this  eminent  individual,  John  Cotton  ;  Thomas 
Hooker,  a  man  very  little  inferior  to  him  in  worth  and  influ 
ence  ;  and,  at  a  later  period,  Dr.  Increase  Mather,  who  suc 
ceeded  to  the  estimation  which  Cotton  had  enjoyed,  and  whose 
family  supplied  no  fewer  than  ten  of  the  most  popular  ministers 
of  the  age  which  they  adorned  to  the  churches  of  Massachu 
setts,  and  produced  the  celebrated  author  of  the  ecclesiastical 
history  of  New  England.  If  all  the  provincial  churches  had 
been  guided  by  such  spirits  as  these,  the  agitated  minds  of  the 
inhabitants  would  doubtless  have  sooner  attained  a  settled 
composure  ;  but,  unfortunately,  the  intolerant  and  contentious 
disposition  which  many  of  the  people  had  contracted  did  not 
long  wait  for  ministerial  leaders  to  excite  and  develope  its  ac 
tivity. 

The  first  theological  dissension  that  arose  in  the  colony  was 
promoted  by  Roger  Williams  [1634],  who  emigrated  to  New 
England  in  1630,  and  officiated  for  some  time  as  pastor  of  New 
Plymouth.  Not  finding  there  an  audience  of  congenial  spirits, 
he  obtained  leave  to  resign  that  charge,  and  had  recently 
been  appointed  minister  of  Salem.  This  man  was  a  stubborn 
Brownist,  keen,  unpliant,  illiberal,  unforbearing,  and  passionate  ; 
seasoning  evil  with  good,  and  error  with  truth,  he  began  to  vent 
from  the  pulpit,  which  he  had  gained  by  his  substantial  piety 
and  fervid  zeal,  a  singular  medley  of  notions,  some  wildly 
speculative,  some  boldly  opposed  to  the  constitutions  of  civil 
society,  and  some,  which,  if  unexceptionable  in  the  abstract, 
were  unsuitable  to  the  scene  of  their  promulgation,  and  to  the 
exercises  and  sentiments  with  which  he  endeavoured  to  blend 
them.  He  insisted  that  it  was  not  lawful  for  an  unregenerate 
man  to  pray,  nor  for  Christians  to  join  in  family  prayer  with 
those  whom  they  judged  unregenerate  ;  that  it  was  not  lawful 
to  take  an  oath  to  the  civil  magistrate,  —  not  even  the  oath  of 
allegiance,  which  he  had  declined  himself  to  take,  and  advised 
his  congregation  equally  to  repudiate  ;  that  King  Charles  had 
unjustly  usurped  the  power  of  disposing  of  the  territory  of  the 
Indians,  and  hence  the  colonial  patent  was  utterly  invalid  ;  that 
the  civil  magistrate  had  no  right  to  restrain  or  direct  the  con 
sciences  of  men  ;  and  that  any  thing  short  of  unlimited  tolera 
tion  for  all  religious  systems  was  detestable  persecution. 


CHAP.  II.]  ROGER  WILLIAMS.  231 

These  liberal  principles  of  toleration  he  combined  with  a 
spirit  so  rigid  and  separative,  that  he  not  only  refused  all  com 
munion  with  persons  who  did  not  profess  every  one  of  the 
foregoing  opinions,  but  forbade  the  members  of  the  church  at 
Salem  to  communicate  with  any  of  the  other  churches  in  the 
colony  ;  and  when  they  refused  to  obey  this  prohibition,  he 
forsook  his  ministerial  office  among  them,  and  established  a 
separate  meeting  in  a  private  house.  He  even  withdrew  from 
the  society  of  his  wife,  because  she  continued  to  attend  the 
church  of  Salem,  and  from  that  of  his  children,  because  he 
accounted  them  unregenerate.  In  his  retirement  he  was  at 
tended  by  a  select  assembly  of  zealous  admirers,  consisting  of 
men  in  whose  minds  an  impetuous  temper,  inflamed  by  perse 
cution,  had  greatly  impaired  the  sense  of  moral  perspective  ; 
who  entertained  disproportioned  ideas  of  those  branches  of  the 
trunk  of  godliness,  for  the  sake  of  which  they  had  endured 
severe  affliction,  and  had  seen  worth  and  piety  foully  wronged  ; 
and  who  abhorred  every  symbol,  badge,  and  practice,  that  was 
associated  with  the  remembrance,  and  stained,  as  they  con 
ceived,  with  the  iniquity,  of  their  idolatrous  oppressors.  One 
of  these  individuals,  Endicott,  u  magistrate  of  the  place,  and 
formerly  deputy-governor  of  the  colony,  in  a  transport  of  de 
vouring  zeal  against  superstition,  was  instigated  by  Williams  to 
cut  the  red  cross  out  of  the  royal  standard  ;  and  many  of  the 
trained  bands,  who  had  hitherto  followed  this  standard  without 
objection,  caught  the  contagion  of  Endicott's  fervor,  and  pro 
tested  that  they  would  no  longer  follow  a  flag  on  which  the 
popish  emblem  of  a  crucifix  was  painted.  The  intemperate 
and  disorderly  conduct  of  Endicott  was  generally  disapproved, 
and  the  provincial  authorities  punished  his  misdemeanour  by 
reprimand  and  disability  of  holding  office  for  a  year ;  but  they 
were  obliged  to  compromise  the  dispute  with  the  protesters 
among  the  trained  bands,  and  to  comply  with  their  remon 
strances.  It  is  a  notable  fact,  and  illustrative  perhaps  of  the 
extent  of  their  compliance,  that,  only  two  years  after,  when 
they  were  pressed  with  (apparently)  friendly  counsel  to  dissi 
pate  English  jealousy  by  hoisting  the  British  flag  on  the  walls 
of  their  little  fort  not  a  single  royal  ensign  could  be  found  in 
Massachusetts.  They  were  preparing  to  call  Williams  to  a 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

judicial  reckoning,  when  Cotton  and  some  other  clergymen 
interposed,  and  desired  to  be  allowed  to  reason  with  him  ; 
alleging  that  his  vehemence  and  breach  of  order  betokened 
rather  a  misguided  conscience,  than  seditious  principles  ;  and 
that  there  was  hope  that  they  might  gain,  instead  of  losing, 
their  brother.  You  are  deceived  in  that  man,  if  you  think  he 
will  condescend  to  learn  of  any  of  you,  was  the  prediction  of 
the  governor  ;  and  the  result  of  the  conference  proving  the 
justice  of  it,1  sentence  of  banishment  from  the  colony  was 
forthwith  pronounced  against  Williams. 

This  sentence  excited  a  great  uproar  in  Salem,  and  was  so 
successfully  denounced  as  persecution  by  the  adherents  of 
Williams,  that  the  bulk  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  place  were 
preparing  to  follow  him  into  exile,  when  an  earnest  and  pious 
admonition,  addressed  to  them  by  Cotton  and  the  other  min 
isters  of  Boston,  induced  them  to  relinquish  their  purpose, 
to  acknowledge  the  justice  of  the  proceeding,  and  abandon 
Williams  to  his  fate.  Still,  was  he  not  abandoned  by  his  more 
select  admirers,  whose  esteem  and  affection  he  had  gained  to 
such  a  degree,  that  they  resolved  to  brave  every  hardship,  in 
order  to  live  and  die  with  him.  Accompanying  him  in  his 
exile,  they  directed  their  march  towards  the  south  ;  and  set 
tling  at  a  place  beyond  the  jurisdiction  of  Massachusetts,  they 
purchased  a  considerable  tract  of  land  from  the  Indians,  and 
bestowed  on  their  plantation  the  name  of  Providence.  Had 
Williams  encountered  the  severities  to  which  the  publication 
of  his  peculiar  opinions  would  have  exposed  him  in  England, 
he  would  probably  have  lost  his  senses  ;  the  wiser  and  kinder 
treatment  he  experienced  from  the  Massachusetts  authorities 
was  productive  of  happier  effects  ;  and  Cotton  and  his  col 
leagues  were  not  wholly  mistaken  in  supposing  that  they  would 
gain  their  brother.  They  gained  him,  indeed,  in  a  manner 

1  Though  he  would  not  retract  his  dogmas,  it  seems  that  some  of  the  argu 
ments  that  were  employed  with  him  sank  into  his  .mind,  and  at  least  reduced 
him  to  silence.  Hooker,  one  of  the  ministers  who  were  sent  to  deal  with  him, 
urged,  among  other  reasonings,  —  "  If  it  be  unlawful  for  an  unregenerate  per 
son  to  pray,  it  is  unlawful  for  your  unregenerate  child  to  ask  a  blessing  on  his 
meat;  and  if  so,  it  is  unlawful  for  him  to  eat,  since  food  is  sanctified  by  prayer, 
and  without  prayer  unsanctified  (1  Tim.  iv.  4,  5)  ;  and  it  must  be  equally  un 
lawful  for  you  to  invite  him  to  eat,  since  you  ought  not  to  tempt  him  to  sin." 
To  this  he  declined  making  any  answer.  —  Mather. 


CHAP.  II.]         REPRESENTATIVE   GOVERNMENT.  233 

less  flattering  to  themselves  than  a  controversial  victory  would 
have  been,  but  much  more  beneficial  to  the  interests  of  Ameri 
ca.  He  contributed,  as  we  shall  see,  to  found  the  colony  of 
Rhode  Island,  and  was  one  of  its  most  eminent  benefactors. 
He  lived  to  an  advanced  age  ;  and  gradually  emancipating  him 
self  from  the  impetuous  and  yet  punctilious  spirit  with  which 
his  doctrinal  sentiments  had  originally  been  leavened,  he  re 
gained  the  friendship  and  esteem  of  his  ancient  fellow-colonists, 
and  preserved  a  friendly  correspondence  with  Cotton  and  oth 
ers  of  them  till  his  death.  The  principles  of  toleration,  which 
he  had  formerly  discredited  by  the  rigidness  with  which  he  dis 
allowed  the  slightest  difference  of  opinion  between  the  mem 
bers  of  his  own  communion,  he  now  recommended  by  the 
exercise  of  meekness,  charity,  and  forbearance.  The  great 
fundamental  principles  of  Christianity  progressively  acquiring  a 
more  exclusive  and  absorbing  influence  on  his  mind,  he  began 
to  labor  for  the  conversion  of  the  Indians  ;  and  in  addition  to 
the  benefits  of  which  his  ministry  among  them  was  productive 
to  this  race  of  people,  he  acquired  over  them  an  influence 
which  he  rendered  highly  advantageous  to  his  old  associates  in 
Massachusetts,  whom  he  was  enabled  frequently  to  apprize  of 
conspiracies  formed  against  them  by  the  savages  in  their  vicini 
ty,  and  revealed  to  him  by  the  tribes  with  whom  he  maintained 
relations  of  friendship.1  Endicott's  vehemence  was  not  less 
mellowed  by  time  and  the  ascendency  of  sound  wisdom  and 
piety.  He  remained  in  Massachusetts  ;  and,  at  a  later  period, 
held  for  many  years  the  chief  office  in  its  government  with 
great  public  advantage  and  general  esteem.2 

The  colony  of  Massachusetts  continued  meanwhile  to  ad 
vance  in  stability  and  prosperity,  and  to  extend  its  settlements  ; 
and  this  year  [1634]  an  important  and  beneficial  change  took 
place  in  its  municipal  constitution.  The  mortality  that  had 
prevailed  among  the  Indians  vacated  a  great  many  stations  for 
merly  occupied  by  their  tribes  ;  and  as  most  of  these  were 
advantageously  situated,  the  colonists  took  possession  of  them 
with  an  eagerness  and  latitude  of  appropriation  that  dispersed 
their  settlements  widely  over  the  face  of  the  country.  This 

1  Mather.     Neal.     Hutchinson.  *  Mather. 

VOL.   i.  30 


234  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

necessarily  led  to  the  introduction  of  representative  govern 
ment  ;  and,  accordingly,  at  the  period  of  convoking  the  Gen 
eral  Court,  the  freemen,  instead  of  personally  attending  it, 
which  was  the  literal  prescription  of  the  provincial  charter, 
elected  deputies  from  their  several  districts,  whom  they  au 
thorized  to  appear  in  their  name  and  act  in  their  behalf.  With 
out  demur  or  objection  from  any  quarter,  the  pretensions  6f  the 
persons  thus  elected  were  recognized  ;  and  the  popular  repre 
sentatives  thenceforward  considered  themselves,  in  conjunction 
with  the  governor  and  council  of  assistants,  as  the  supreme 
legislative  assembly  of  the  province.  The  abstract  wisdom 
of  this  innovation  is  undeniable  ;  and,  in  defence  of  its  legit 
imacy,  it  was  forcibly  urged  that  the  colonists  did  no  more 
than  construct  an  improved  and  necessary  access  to  the  enjoy 
ment  of  an  advantage  already  belonging  to  them,  and  prevent 
their  assemblies  from  becoming  either  too  numerous  to  trans 
act  business,  or  inadequate  to  lepresent  the  general  interest 
and  administer  the  general  will.  The  number  of  freemen  was 
greatly  augmented  since  the  date  of  the  charter  ;  many  resided 
at  a  distance  from  the  places  where  the  general  courts  or  as 
semblies  of  the  freemen  were  held  ;  personal  attendance  had 
become  inconvenient ;  and,  in  such  circumstances,  little  if  any 
blame  can  attach  to  the  colonists  for  effecting  with  their  own 
hands  the  improvement  that  was  necessary  to  preserve  their 
existing  rights,  instead  of  applying  to  the  government  of  Eng 
land,  which  was  steadily  pursuing  the  plan  of  subverting  the  or 
gans  of  liberty  in  the  mother  country,  and  had  already  begun 
to  exhibit  an  altered  countenance  towards  the  colonial  commu 
nity.  In  consequence  of  this  important  measure,  the  colony 
advanced  beyond  the  state  of  a  mercantile  society  or  corpora 
tion,  and  acquired  by  its  own  act  the  condition  of  a  common 
wealth  endowed  with  political  liberty.  The  representatives  of 
the  people,  having  established  themselves  in  their  office,  as 
serted  its  appropriate  privileges  by  decreeing  that  no  legal  or 
dinance  should  be  framed  within  the  province,  no  tax  imposed, 
and  no  public  officer  appointed,  in  future,  except  by  the  pro 
vincial  legislature.1 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


CHAP.  II.]  HUGH  PETERS.  235 

The  increasing  violence  and  injustice  of  the  royal  govern 
ment  in  Britain  cooperated  so  forcibly  with  the  tidings  that 
were  circulated  of  the  prosperity  of  Massachusetts,  —  and  the 
simple  frame  of  ecclesiastical  policy  that  was  established  in  the 
colony  presented  a  prospect  so  desirable,  and  (by  the  com 
parison  which  it  invited)  exposed  the  gorgeous  hierarchy  and 
recent  superstitious  innovations  in  the  ceremonies  of  the  Eng 
lish  church  to  so  much  additional  odium,  —  that  the  flow  of 
emigration  rather  enlarged  than  subsided,  and  crowds  of  new 
settlers  continued  to  flock  to  New  England.  Among  the  pas 
sengers  in  a  fleet  of  twenty  vessels  that  arrived  in  the  ensuing 
year  [1635]  were  two  persons  who  afterwards  made  a  distin 
guished  figure  in  a  more  conspicuous  scene.  One  of  these 
was  Hugh  Peters,  the  celebrated  chaplain  and  counsellor  of 
Oliver  Cromwell  ;  and  the  other  was  Vane,  whose  father,  Sir 
Henry  Vane  the  elder,  enjoyed  the  dignity  of  a  privy  counsel 
lor  at  the  English  court,  and  afterwards  filled  the  office  of  prin 
cipal  secretary  of  state.  Peters,  who  united  an  active  and 
enterprising  genius  with  the  warmest  devotion  to  the  interests 
of  religion  and  liberty,  became  minister  of  Salem,  where  he 
not  only  discharged  his  sacred  functions  with  zeal  and  advan 
tage,  but  suggested  new  hints  of  profitable  industry  to  the 
planters,  and  recommended  his  wise  counsels  by  his  own  suc 
cessful  example.  His  labors  were  blessed  with  a  produce  not 
less  honorable  than  enduring.  The  spirit  which  he  fostered 
has  continued  to  prevail  with  unabated  vigor  ;  and  nearly  two 
centuries  after  his  death,  the  piety,  good  morals,  and  industry, 
by  which  Salem  has  always  been  characterized,  were  ascribed 
with  just  and  grateful  commemoration  to  the  effects  of  Peters's 
residence  there.  He  remained  in  New  England  till  the  year 
1641,  when,  at  the  request  of  the  colonists,  he  went  to  trans 
act  some  business  for  them  in  the  mother  country,  from  which 
he  was  fated  never  to  return.  But  his  race  remained  in  the 
land  thus  highly  indebted  to  his  virtue  ;  and  the  name  of  Win- 
throp,  one  of  the  most  honored  in  New  England,  was  acquired 
and  transmitted  by  his  daughter. 

Vane,  afterwards  Sir  Henry  Vane  the  younger,  had  been 
for  some  time  restrained  from  indulging  his  wish  to  reside  in 
New  England  by  the  prohibition  of  his  father,  who  was  at 


236  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

length  induced  to  wave  his  objections  by  the  interference  of  the 
king.  The  Puritan  principles  which  Vane  had  imbibed,  and 
to  which  he  had  already  sacrificed  his  collegiate  rank  in  the 
university  of  Oxford,  were  distasteful  alike  to  his  father  and 
his  king  ;  and  while  the  one  dreaded  the  effect  of  his  inter 
course  with  the  Puritans  of  Massachusetts,  the  other  feared 
the  influence  of  his  example  in  England.  A  young  man  of  pa 
trician  family,  animated « with  such  ardent  devotion  to  the  cause 
of  pure  religion  and  liberty,  that,  relinquishing  the  most  bril 
liant  prospects  in  Britain,  he  chose  to  inhabit  an  infant  colony 
which  as  yet  afforded  little  more  than  a  bare  subsistence  to  its 
inhabitants,  was  received  in  New  England  with  the  fondest  re 
gard  and  admiration.  He  was  then  little  more  than  twenty-four 
years  of  age.  His  youth,  which  seemed  to  magnify  the  sacri 
fice  he  made,  increased  no  less  the  impression  which  his  man 
ners  and  appearance  were  calculated  to  produce.  The  fixed, 
thoughtful  composure  of  his  aspect  and  demeanour  stamped  a 
serious  grace  and  somewhat  (according  to  our  conceptions)  of 
angelic  grandeur  on  the  bloom  of  manhood  ;  his  countenance 
disclosed  the  surface  of  a  character  not  less  resolute  than  pro 
found,  and  of  which  the  energy  was  not  extinguished,  but  con 
centrated  into  a  sublime  and  solemn  calm.  He  possessed  a 
prompt  and  clear  discernment  of  the  characters  and  purposes  of 
other  men,  and  a  wonderful  mastery  of  his  own  spirit.  Claren 
don  ascribes  to  him  "  a  quick  conception  and  ready,  sharp, 
and  weighty  expression,  an  unusual  aspect,  a  vultum  clausum, 
which,  though  no  man  could  guess  what  he  intended,  yet  made 
men  think  there  was  something  in  him  extraordinary  ;  and  his 
whole  life  made  good  that  imagination."  He  has  been  charged 
with  a  wild  enthusiasm  l  by  some  who  have  remarked  the  in 
tensity  with  which  he"  pursued  purposes  which  to  them  ap 
peared  worthless  and  ignoble  ;  and  with  hypocrisy  by  others, 
who  have  contrasted  the  vigor  of  his  resolution  with  the  calm 
ness  of  his  manners.  But  a  juster  consideration,  perhaps, 

1  One  ingenious  writer  speaks  more  respectfully  of  Vane's  enthusiasm  ;  de 
claring  that  "  it  seems  never  to  have  precipitated  him  into  injudicious  meas 
ures,  but  to  have  added  new  powers  to  his  natural  sagacity."  "  He  mistook," 
continues  the  writer,  "  his  deep  penetration  for  a  prophetic  spirit,  and  the  light 
of  his  genius  for  divine  irradiation."  I  see  no  proof  that  he  entertained  the 
first  of  these  notions,  and  no  mistake  in  the  second. 


CHAP.  II.]  SIR  HENRY  VANE.  237 

may  suggest  that  it  was  the  habitual  energy  of  his  determina 
tion  that  repressed  every  sympton  of  vehement  impetuosity, 
and  induced  an  equality  of  manner  that  scarcely  appeared  to 
exceed  the  pitch  of  a  grave,  deliberate  constancy.  So  much 
did  his  mind  predominate  over  his  senses,  that,  although  con 
stitutionally  timid,1  and  keenly  susceptible  of  impressions  of 
pain,  yet  his  whole  life  was  one  continued  course  of  great  and 
daring  enterprise  ;  and  when,  amidst  the  wreck  of  his  fortunes 
and  the  treachery  of  his  associates,  death  was  presented  to 
him  in  the  appalling  form  of  a  bloody  execution,  he  prepared 
for  it  with  a  heroic  and  smiling  intrepidity,  and  encountered 
it  with  tranquil  and  dignified  resignation.  The  man  who  could 
so  command  himself  was  formed  to  acquire  ascendency  over 
the  minds  of  others.  He  was  instantly  admitted  a  freeman  of 
Massachusetts  ;  and  extending  his  claims  to  respect  by  the  ad 
dress  and  ability  which  he  displayed  in  conducting  business, 
was  elected  governor  in  the  year  subsequent  to  his  arrival 
[1636],  by  unanimous  choice,  and  with  the  highest  expecta 
tions  of  a  happy  and  advantageous  administration.  These 
expectations  were  disappointed.  Vane,  not  finding  in  the  po 
litical  affairs  of  the  colonists  a  wide  enough  field  for  the  excur 
sion  of  his  active  spirit,  embarked  its  energy  in  their  theo 
logical  discussions  ;  and,  unfortunately,  connecting  himself  with 
a  party  who  had  conceived  singularly  clear  and  profound  views 
of  Christian  doctrine,  but  associated  them  with  some  danger 
ous  errors,  and  discredited  them  by  a  wild  extravagance  of  be 
haviour,  he  very  soon  witnessed  the  abridgment  of  his  useful 
ness  and  the  decline  of  his  popularity.2 

The  incessant  flow  of  emigration  to  Massachusetts,  causing 
the  inhabitants  of  some  of  the  towns  to  feel  themselves  strait 
ened  for  room,  suggested  the  formation  of  additional  settle 
ments.  A  project  of  founding  a  new  colony  on  the  banks  of 

1  See  note  VI.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

*  America  Painted  to  the  Life,  by  Ferdinando  Gorges.  There  is  a  copy  of 
this  work  in  the  Redcross-street  Library  of  London.  Neal.  Hutchinson. 
Dwight's  Travels  in  New  England  and  New  York.  Upham's  Life  of  Sir  Hen 
ry  Vane,  in  Sparks's  American  Biography.  New  England  has  now  repaid 
Vane's  noble  devotion  by  the  best  (Mr.  Upham's)  memoir  of  that  great  man 
that  has  ever  been  given  to  the  world.  Vane  was  accompanied  to  America 
by  Lord  Leigh,  son  of  the  Earl  of  Marlborough,  who  had  conceived  a  cu 
riosity  to  behold  the  New  England  settlements. 


238  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

the  River  Connecticut  was  now  embraced  by  Hooker,  one  of 
the  ministers  of  Boston,  and  a  hundred  of  the  members  of  his 
congregation.  After  enduring  extreme  hardship,  and  encoun 
tering  the  usual  difficulties  that  attended  the  foundation  of 
civilized  society  in  this  quarter  of  America,  with  the  usual  dis 
play  of  Puritan  fortitude  and  resolution,  they  succeeded  in  es 
tablishing  a  plantation,  which  gradually  enlarged  into  the  flour 
ishing  State  of  Connecticut.  Some  Dutch  settlers  from  New 
York,  who  took  prior  possession  of  a  post  in  this  country, 
were  compelled  to  surrender  it  to  the  British  colonists,  who, 
moreover,  obtained  shortly  after  from  Lord  Brooke  and  Lord 
Say  and  Seal  an  assignation  to  a  district  which  these  noblemen 
had  acquired  in  the  same  quarter,  with  the  intention  of  flying 
from  royal  tyranny  to  America.1  Hooker  and  his  comrades 
relied  for  a  while  on  a  commission  which  they  procured  from 
the  government  of  Massachusetts  for  the  administration  of  jus 
tice  in  their  new  settlement  ;  but  subsequently  ascertaining  that 
their  territory  was  beyond  the  jurisdiction  of  the  magistrates 
from  whom  the  commission  was  derived,  they  combined  them 
selves  by  a  voluntary  association  into  a  body  politic,  construct 
ed  on  the  model  of  the  colonial  society  from  which  they  had 
separated.  They  continued  in  this  condition  till  the  Restora 
tion,  when  they  obtained  a  charter  for  themselves  from  King 
Charles  the  Second.  That  this  secession  from  the  colony  of 
Massachusetts  was  occasioned  by  lack  of  room  in  a  province 
yet  imperfectly  peopled  has  appeared  so  improbable  to  some 
writers,  that  they  have  thought  it  necessary  to  assign  another 
cause,  and  have  found  none  so  credible  or  satisfactory  as  the 
jealousy  which  they  conclude  that  Hooker  must  inevitably 
have  entertained  towards  Cotton,  whose  patriarchal  authority 
had  attained  such  a  height  in  Massachusetts,  that  even  a  formi- 

1  Lord  Brooke  and  Lord  Say  and  Seal  so  far  pursued  their  design  as  to  send 
an  agent  to  take  possession  of  their  territory,  and  build  a  fort.  Happily  for 
America,  the  sentiments  and  habits  that  rendered  them  unfit  members  of  a  so 
ciety  where  complete  civil  liberty  and  perfect  simplicity  of  manners  were  es 
teemed  requisite  to  the  general  happiness,  prevented  these  noblemen  from 
carrying  their  project  into  execution.  They  proposed  to  establish  an  order  of 
nobility  and  hereditary  magistracy  in  America ;  and  consumed  so  much  time 
in  arguing  this  important  point  with  the  other  settlers  who  were  to  be  asso 
ciated  with  them,  that  at  length  their  ardor  for  emigration  subsided,  and 
nearer  and  more  interesting  prospects  opened  to  their  activity  in  England. 
—  Chalmers. 


CHAP.  II.]         SETTLEMENT  OF  CONNECTICUT.  239 

dable  civil  broil  was  quelled  by  one  of  his  pacific  discourses. 
But  envy  was  not  a  passion  congenial  to  the  breast  of  Hooker, 
or  likely  to  be  generated  by  the  character  or  influence  of  Cot 
ton.  The  notion  of  a  redundant  population  was  the  more 
readily  conceived  at  this  period  from  the  unwillingness  of  the 
settlers  to  penetrate  far  into  the  interior  of  the  country,  and 
thus  deprive  themselves  of  an  easy  communication  with  the 
coast.  Another  reason,  indeed,  appears  to  have  suggested  the 
formation  of  the  new  settlement ;  but  it  was  a  reason  that  ar 
gued  not  dissension,  but  community  of  feeling  and  design  be 
tween  the  planters  who  remained  in  Massachusetts  and  those 
wTho  removed  to  Connecticut.  By  the  establishment  of  this 
advanced  station,  a  barrier,  it  was  hoped,  would  be  erected 
against  the  vexatious  incursions  of  the  Pequod  Indians.1  Nor 
is  it  unlikely  that  some  of  the  seceders  to  the  new  settlement 
were  actuated  by  a  restless  spirit,  which  had  expected  too  much 
from  external  change,  and  winch  vainly  urged  a  farther  pursuit 
of  that  spring  of  contentment  which  must  arise  in  the  minds  of 
those  who  would  enjoy  it. 

In  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of  this  new  settlement 
another  plantation  was  formed,  about  two  years  after  [1638], 
by  a  numerous  band  of  emigrants  who  arrived  from  Eng 
land  under  tlie  guidance  of  Theophilus  Eaton,  a  man  of  large 
fortune,  and  John  Davenport,  an  eminent  Puritan  minister. 
Averse  to  erect  the  social  institutions  which  they  projected 
upon  foundations  previously  laid  by  other  hands,  these  adven 
turers  declined  to  settle  in  Massachusetts,  which  already  pre 
sented  the  scene  of  a  thriving  and  well  compacted  community  ; 
and  smit  with  the  attractions  of  a  vacant  territory  skirting  the 
large  and  commodious  sound  to  the  southwest  of  Connecti 
cut  River,  they  purchased  from  its  Indian  owners  all  the 
land  that  lies  between  that  stream  and  the  line  which  now 
separates  New  England  from  New  York.  Repairing  to  the 

1  Mather.  Hutchinson.  Trumbull.  It  appears  from  Mather's  Lives,  that 
Cotton  and  Hooker  were  knit  together  in  the  firmest  bonds  of  Christian  friend 
ship  and  cordial  esteem.  Yet  these  men,  who  forsook  houses,  lands,  and 
country  for  the  sake  of  the  gospel,  are  described  by  Dr.  Robertson  as  "  rival 
competitors  in  the  contest  for  fame  and  power  "  !  This  is  the  only  light  in 
which  many  eminent  and  even  reverend  writers  are  capable  of  regarding  the 
labors  of  the  patriot,  the  saint,  and  the  sage.  It  is  not  uncommon  for  men,  in 
attempting  to  paint  the  character  of  others,  unconsciously  to  transcribe  their 
own. 


240  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

shores  of  this  sound,  they  built,  first  the  town  of  New  Ha 
ven,  which  gave  its  name  to  the  whole  colony,  and  then 
the  towns  of  Guilford,  Milford,  Stamford,  and  Branford. 
After  some  time  they  crossed  the  sound,  and  planted  various 
settlements  in  Long  Island  ;  in  all  places  where  they  came, 
erecting  churches  on  the  model  of  the  Independents.  When 
we  observe  the  injustice  and  cruelty  exercised  by  the  govern 
ment  of  Britain,  thus  contributing  to  cover  the  earth  with 
cities  and  to  plant  religion  and  liberty  in  the  savage  deserts  of 
America,  we  recognize  the  overruling  providence  of  that  Being 
who  can  render  even  the  insolence  of  tyrants  who  usurp  his 
attributes  conducive  to  his  honor.  Having  no  royal  patent, 
nor  any  other  title  to  their  lands  than  the  vendition  of  the 
natives,  and  not  being  included  within  the  boundaries  of  any 
provincial  jurisdiction  established  by  British  authority,  the 
planters  of  New  Haven  united  in  a  compact  of  voluntary  as 
sociation  of  the  same  nature  and  for  the  same  ends  with  that 
which  the  founders  of  Connecticut  had  embraced  ;  and  in  this 
condition  they  remained  till  the  Restoration,  when  New  Haven 
and  Connecticut  were  united  together  by  a  charter  of  King 
Charles  the  Second.1 

When  the  plantation  of  Connecticut  was  first  projected, 
hopes  were  entertained  that  it  might  conduce  to  overawe  the 
hostility  of  the  Indians  ;  but  it  produced  a  perfectly  opposite 
effect.  The  tribes  of  Indians  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of 
Massachusetts  Bay  were  comparatively  feeble  and  unwarlike  ; 
but  the  colonies  of  Providence  and  Connecticut  were  planted 
in  the  midst  of  powerful  and  martial  hordes.  Among  these, 
the  most  considerable  were  the  Narragansets,  who  inhabited  the 

1  Neal.  The  colonists  of  Massachusetts  were  very  desirous  that  Davenport 
and  his  associates  should  settle  among  them.  But "  it  had  been  an  observation 
of  Mr.  Davenport's,  that,  whenever  a  reformation  had  been  effected  in  any 
part  of  the  world,  it  had  rested  where  it  had  been  left  by  the  reformers.  It 
could  not  be  advanced  another  step.  He  was  now  embarked  in  a  design  of 
forming  a  civil  and  religious  constitution  as  near  as  possible  to  Scripture  precept 
and  example.  The  principal  gentlemen  who  had  followed  him  to  America 
had  the  same  views.  In  laying  the  foundation  of  a  new  colony,  there  was  a 
fair  probability  that  they  might  accommodate  all  matters  of  church  and  com 
monwealth  to  their  own  feelings  and  sentiments.  But  in  Massachusetts  the 
principal  men  were  fixed  in  the  chief  seats  of  government,  which  they  were 
likely  to  keep,  and  their  civil  and  religious  polity  was  already  formed." 
Trumbull.  In  the  history  of  every  great  public  reform,  religious  or  political, 
we  may  remark  the  operation,  among  the  leading  reformers,  of  a  narrow, 
selfish,  arrogant  spirit,  timidly  or  ambitiously  contending  for  finality  and  op 
posed  to  ulterior  progress. 


CHAP.  II.]  THE  PEQUOD  WAR. 

shores  of  the  bay  which  bears  their  name  ;  and  the  Pequods, 
who  occupied  the  territory  which  stretches  from  the  River 
Pequod1  to  the  banks  of  the  Connecticut.  The  Pequods  were 
a  numerous  tribe,  and  renowned  for  their  prowess  and  ferocity. 
They  entertained,  from  the  first,  a  jealous  hatred  of  the  Eu 
ropean  colonists,  and  for  some  time  past  had  harassed  them 
with  unprovoked  attacks,  and  excited  their  abhorrence  and 
indignation  by  the  monstrous  outrages  to  which  they  subjected 
their  captives.  Unoffending  men,  women,  and  children,  who 
fell  into  their  hands,  were  scalped  and  sent  back  to  their  friends, 
or  put  to  death  with  every  circumstance  of  torture  and  indignity, 
—  while  the  assassins,  with  diabolical  glee  and  derision,  chal 
lenged  them  to  invoke  the  God  of  the  Christians,  and  put  to 
the  proof  his  power  to  save  them.  The  extension  of  the 
English  settlements  excited  anew  the  fury  of  the  savages,  and 
produced  a  repetition  of  injuries,  which  Vane,  the  governor  of 
Massachusetts,  determined  at  length  to  retaliate  and  punish  by 
offensive  operations.  Receiving  intelligence  of  a  serious  attack 
by  the  Pequods  on  the  Connecticut  settlers  [-1637],  he  sum 
moned  all  the  New  England  communities  to  assemble  and  de 
spatch  the  strongest  force  they  could  contribute  to  the  defence 
of  their  countrymen  and  of  the  common  cause  of  European 
colonization.  The  Pequods,  aware  of  the  impending  danger, 
were  not  negligent  of  prudent  precautions,  as  well  as  active 
endeavours  to  repel  it.  To  this  end,  they  sought  a  reconcilia 
tion  with  the  Narragansets,  their  hereditary  enemies  and  rivals 
in  power  ;  proposing  that  on  both  sides  the  remembrance  of 
ancient  quarrels  and  animosities  should  be  buried,  or  at  least 
suspended  ;  and  urging  the  Narragansets  for  once  to  cooperate 
cordially  with  them  against  a  common  foe,  whose  progressive 
encroachments  threatened  to  confound  them  both  in  one  com 
mon  destruction.  But  the  Narragansets  had  long  cherished  a 
fierce  and  deep-rooted  hatred  against  the  Pequods  ;  and,  less 
moved  by  a  distant  prospect  of  danger  to  themselves,  than  by 
the  hope  of  an  instant  gratification  of  their  implacable  revenge, 
they  rejected  the  proposals  of  accommodation,  and  determined 
to  assist  the  English  in  the  prosecution  of  the  war.2 

1  The  Thames.  2  Mather.    Neal.     Trumbull. 

VOL.    I.  31 


242    '  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Enraged,  but  not  dismayed,  by  this  disappointment,  the  Pe- 
quods  hastened,  by  the  vigor  of  their  operations,  to  anticipate 
the  junction  of  the  allied  provincial  forces  ;  and  the  Connecti 
cut  troops,  while  as  yet  they  had  received  but  a  small  part  of 
the  succour  which  their  friends  had  engaged  to  afford  them, 
found  it  necessary  to  advance  against  the  enemy.  The  Pequod 
warriors,  amounting  in  number  to  more  than  fifteen  hundred, 
commanded  by  Sassacus,  their  principal  sachem,  occupied  two 
fortified  stations,  against  one  of  which  Captain  Mason  and  the 
Connecticut  militia,  consisting  only  of  ninety  men,  attended  by  * 
a  troop  of  Indian  allies,  directed  their  attack.  The  approach 
of  Mason  was  quickened  by  the  information  he  obtained,  that 
the  enemy,  deceived  by  a  seemingly  retrograde  movement  of 
the  provincial  force,  had  abandoned  themselves  to  the  convic 
tion  that  the  English  dared  not  encounter  them,  and  were  cele 
brating  with  festive  revel  and  premature  triumph  the  supposed 
evacuation  of  their  country.  About  daybreak,  while  wrapped 
in  deep  slumber  and  supine  security,  they  were  approached  by 
the  colonists  ;  and  the  surprise  would  have  been  complete,  if 
an  alarm  had  not  been  communicated  by  the  barking  of  a  dog. 
The  war-whoop  was  instantly  sounded,  and  they  flew  to  their 
arms.  The  English  troops  rushed  on  to  the  attack  ;  and  while 
some  of  them  fired  on  the  Indians  through  the  palisades,  others 
forced  their  way  by  the  entrances  into  the  fort,  and,  setting  fire 
to  the  huts,  which  were  covered  with  reeds,  involved  their  ene 
mies  in  the  confusion  and  horror  of  a  general  conflagration. 
The  Pequods,  notwithstanding  the  disadvantage  of  their  pre 
dicament,  behaved  with  great  intrepidity  ;  but,  after  a  stout  and 
obstinate  resistance,  they  were  defeated,  with  the  slaughter  of 
at  least  five  hundred  of  their  tribe.  Many  of  the  women  and 
children  perished  in  the  flames  ;  and  the  warriors,  endeavouring 
to  escape,  were  slain  by  the  colonists,  or,  falling  into  the  hands 
of  the  Indian  allies  of  the  English,  who  surrounded  the  fort  at 
a  distance,  were  reserved  for  a  more  cruel  fate.  Soon  after 
this  action,  Captain  Stoughton  having  arrived  with  the  auxiliary 
troops  from  Massachusetts,  it  was  resolved  to  pursue  the  vic 
tory.  Several  engagements  took  place,  which  terminated  un 
favorably  for  the  Pequods  ;  and  in  a  short  time  they  sustained 
another  general  defeat,  which  put  an  end  to  the  war.  A  few 


CHAP.  II.]  THE   PEQUOD  WAR.  243 

only  of  this  once  powerful  nation  survived,  who,  abandoning 
their  country  to  the  victorious  Europeans,  dispersed  themselves 
among  the  neighbouring  tribes,  and  lost  their  existence  as  a 
separate  people.  Sassacus  had  been  an  object  of  superstitious 
terror  to  the  Narragansets,  who  at  first  endeavoured  to  dissuade 
the  colonists  from  risking  a  personal  encounter  with  him,  by 
the  assurance  that  his  life  was  charmed  and  his  person  invul 
nerable.  After  the  destruction  of  his  people,  and  when  he 
fled  for  refuge  to  a  distant  tribe,  the  Narragansets  passing,  by 
natural  progress,  from  terror  to  cruelty,  solicited  and  prevailed 
with  his  hosts  to  cut  off  his  head.1  Thus  terminated  a  strug 
gle,  more  important  from  its  consequences  than  from  the  num 
bers  of  the  combatants  or  the  celebrity  of  their  names.  On 
its  issue  there  had  been  staked  no  less  than  the  question, 
whether  Christianity  and  civilization,  or  paganism  and  barbarity, 
should  prevail  in  New  England. 

This  first  military  enterprise  of  the  colonists  was  conducted 
with  vigor  and  ability,  and  impressed  the  Indian  race  with  a 
high  opinion  of  their  steadfast  courage  and  superior  skill. 
Their  victory,  it  must  be  confessed,  was  sullied  by  cruelties, 
which  it  is  easy  to  account  for  and  extenuate,  but  painful  to 
recollect.  The  Massachusetts  militia,  previously  to  their  march, 
exerted  no  small  diligence  in  purging  their  ranks  of  all  persons 
whose  religious  sentiments  did  not  fully  correspond  with  the 
general  standard  of  faith  and  orthodoxy.2  It  had  been  happy, 
if  they  could  have  purged  their  own  bosoms  of  the  vindictive 
feelings  which  the  outrages  of  their  savage  foes  were  but  too 
well  fitted  to  inspire.  Some  of  the  prisoners  were  tortured 
by  the  Indian  allies,  whose  cruelties  we  can  hardly  doubt  that 
the  English  might  have  prevented  ;  a  considerable  number 

1  Mather.     Neal.     Hutchinson.     Trumbull.     The  destruction  of  the  brave 
Pequods,  though  provoked  by  their  own  aggressive  hostility,  was  lamented 
about  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  by  an  American  divine  and  poet :  — 

"  Indulge,  my  native  land !  indulge  the  tear 

That  steals  impassioned  o'er  a  nation's  doom ; 
To  me  each  twig  from  Adam's  stock  is  near, 

And  sorrows  fall  upon  an  Indian's  tomb."  —  Dwight. 

2  Regimental   chaplains   accompanied  the   New   England  forces   in   their 
campaigns  ;  and  in  circumstances  of  doubt  or  danger,  the  chaplain  was  invited 
to  pray  for  divine  direction  and   assistance.     When  a  commander-in-chief 
was  appointed,  his  truncheon  was  delivered  to  him  by  one  of  the  clergy. — 
Trumbull. 


244  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

were  sold  as  slaves  in  Bermudas,1  and  the  rest  were  reduced 
to  servitude  in  the  New  England  settlements.  In  aggravation 
of  the  reproach  which  these  proceedings  undoubtedly  merit,  it 
has  been  urged,  but  with  very  little  reason,  that  the  Pequods 
were  entitled  to  the  treatment  of  an  independent  people  gal 
lantly  striving  to  defend  their  property,  their  rights,  and  their 
freedom.  But,  in  truth,  the  Pequods  were  the  aggressors  in 
an  unjust  quarrel,  and  were  fighting  all  along  in  support  of 
unprovoked  and  ferocious  purposes  of  extermination.  The 
colonists  had  conducted  themselves  with  undeviating  justice, 
civility,  and  Christian  benevolence  towards  the  Indians.  They 
treated  fairly  with  them  for  the  ceded  territories  ;  assisted  them 
by  counsel  and  help  in  their  diseases  and  their  agriculture  ;  and 
labored  to  communicate  to  them  the  blessings  of  religion. 
They  disallowed  all  acquisitions  of  territory  from  the  Indians, 
but  such  as  underwent  the  scrutiny  and  received  the  sanction 
of  the  colonial  magistracy  ;  and  they  offered  a  participation  of 
all  the  rights  and  privileges  of  their  commonwealth  to  every 
Indian  who  would  embrace  the  faith  of  a  Christian  and  the 
manners  of  a  civilized  human  being.  In  return  for  these  demon 
strations  of  good-will,  they  experienced  the  most  exasperating 
outrage  and  barbarity,  directed  against  all  that  they  reverenced 
or  loved  ;  and  were  forcibly  impressed  with  the  conviction, 
that  they  must  either  extirpate  those  sanguinary  idolaters,  or 
leave  themselves  and  their  wives,  children,  and  Christian  kin 
dred  exposed  to  a  far  more  horrid  extermination.2  Even  in 
the  course  of  the  war,  they  made  propositions  of  lenity  to  the 
savages,  on  the  condition  of  their  delivering  up  the  murderers 
of  the  English  ;  but  their  offers  were  uniformly  rejected  ;  and 
the  people  who  thus  avouched  the  murders  as  national  acts 
invited  the  avengers  of  blood  to  visit  them  with  national  pun 
ishments. 

1  A  similar  punishment  was  inflicted,  some  years  after,  in  England,  on  a 
number  of  the  royalists  who  were  implicated  in  Penruddock's  insurrection. — 
Hume. 

2  The  colonists  considered   themselves  in  some  degree   accessory  to  the 
crimes  which  they  failed  to  prevent  by  neglect  of  any  of  the  means  warranted 
by  strict  justice.    Belknap  cites  the  following  entry  in  a  MS.  Journal  of  Events 
in  New  England,  some  years  posterior  to  this  period.     "  The  house  of  John 
Keniston  was  burned,  and  he  killed,  at  Greenland.     The  Indians  are  Simon, 
Andrew,  and  Peter.     Those  three  we  had  in  prison,  and  should  have  killed. 
The  good  Lord  pardon  us!" —  History  of  New  Hampshire. 


CHAP.  II.]  TREATMENT  OF  THE  INDIANS.  245 

The  mutual  hostilities  of  civilized  nations,  waged  by  dispas 
sionate  mercenaries,  and  directed  by  leaders  more  eager  for 
fame  than  prompted  by  animosity  or  personal  apprehension, 
may  be  conducted  on  the  principles  of  a  splendid  game.  But 
such  hostilities  as  those  which  the  New  England  colonists  were 
compelled  to  wage  with  the  hordes  of  savage  assassins  who 
attacked  them  will  always  display  human  passions  in  their 
naked  horror  and  ferocity.  The  permission  (for  we  must  sup 
pose  that  they  could  have  prevented  it)  of  the  barbarity  of 
their  savage  allies  appears  the  least  excusable  feature  in  their 
conduct.  And  yet,  in  considering  it,  we  must  add  to  our  al 
lowance  for  passion  inflamed  by  enormous  provocation  a  rea 
sonable  regard  to  the  danger  and  inexpediency  of  checking 
that  mutual  enmity  of  the  savages,  which  prevented  a  combina 
tion  that  might  have  proved  fatal  to  all  the  European  settle 
ments.  The  reduction  of  their  captives  to  servitude  was  un 
questionably  an  illaudable  measure  ;  but  one  for  which  it  would 
not  be  easy  to  suggest  a  substitute.  The  captive  Pequods 
were  treated  with  all  possible  kindness,  and  regarded  rather  as 
indented  servants  than  slaves.  It  must  be  acknowledged,  at 
least,  that  the  colonists  observed  a  magnanimous  consistency  in 
their  international  policy,  and  gave  the  Indians  the  protection 
of  the  same  stern  principles  of  justice  of  which  they  had  taught 
them  to  feel  the  vindictive  energy.  They  not  only  tendered  a 
participation  of  their  own  privileges  and  territory  to  all  civilized 
and  converted  Indians  ;  but,  having  ascertained  the  stations 
which  the  savages  most  highly  valued,  and  the  range  of  terri 
tory  that  seemed  necessary  to  their  comfort  and  happiness, 
they  prohibited  and  annulled  every  transaction  by  which  these 
domains  might  bo  added  to  the  European  acquisitions.  A  short 
time  after  the  termination  of  the  Pequod  war,  an  Indian  having 
been  wantonly  killed  by  some  vagabond  Englishmen,  the  mur 
derers  were  solemnly  tried  and  executed  for  the  crime  ;  and 
the  Indians  beheld  with  astonishment  the  blood  of  three  men 
deliberately  shed  by  their  own  countrymen  for  the  slaughter  of 
one  stranger.  The  sense  of  justice,  cooperating  with  the  re 
pute  of  valor,  secured  to  the  English  settlements  a  long  rest 
from  war.1 

1  Mather.     Neal.    Hutchinson. 


246  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

While  the  military  force  of  Massachusetts  was  thus  exter 
nally  employed,  the  provincial  commonwealth  was  shaken  by 
intestine  dissension,  generated  by  theological  controversy,  and 
inflamed  by  the  gall  of  bitterness  of  unruly  tongues.  [1637.] 
It  was  the  custom  at  that  time  in  Boston,  that  the  members  of 
every  congregation  should  assemble  in  weekly  meetings  to  re 
consider  the  sermons  of  the  preceding  Sunday  ;  to  discuss  the 
doctrinal  instructions  they  had  heard ;  to  revive  the  impressions 
that  had  been  produced  by  their  Sabbatical  exercises  ;  and 
extend  the  sacred  influence  of  the  Sabbath  throughout  the 
week.  Anne  Hutchinson,  the  wife  of  one  of  the  most  respect 
able  inhabitants  of  the  colony,  a  lady  of  masculine  spirit, 
subtle,  ambitious,  and  enthusiastic,  submitted  with  impatience 
to  the  restriction  by  which  women  at  these  meetings  were  de 
barred  from  the  privilege  of  joining  in  the  debates  ;  and  con 
ceiving  that  she  was  authorized  to  exercise  her  didactic  powers 
by  the  precept  of  Scripture  which  enjoins  the  elder  women  to 
teach  the  younger,  she  established  separate  female  assemblages, 
in  which  her  zeal  and  talent  soon  procured  her  a  numerous  and 
admiring  audience.  These  women,  who  had  partaken  the 
struggles  and  perils  of  the  male  colonists,  had  also  caught  no 
small  portion  of  the  various  hues  of  their  spirit ;  and  as  many 
of  them  had  been  accustomed  to  a  life  more  replete  with  ex 
ternal  elegance  and  variety  of  interest  and  employment  than 
the  state  of  the  colony  could  supply,  they  experienced  a  rest 
less  craving  for  something  to  animate  and  engage  their  faculties, 
and  judged  nothing  fitter  for  this  purpose  than  an  imitation  of 
those  exercises  for  the  promotion  of  the  great  common  cause, 
which  seemed  to  minister  so  much  comfort  and  support  to  the 
spirits  of  the  men.  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  their  leader,  gained  by 
her  devout  behaviour  the  cordial  esteem  of  John  Cotton,  whose 
charity  never  failed  to  recognize  in  every  human  being  the 
slightest  trace  of  those  graces  which  he  continually  and  ardent 
ly  longed  to  behold  ;  and  towards  him  she  entertained  and 
professed  for  some  time  a  very  high  veneration.  The  friend 
ship  of  Vane  and  some  others  had  a  less  favorable  influence 
on  her  mind  ;  and  their  admiring  praise  of  the  depth  and  vigor 
of  her  genius  seems  to  have  elevated,  in  her  estimation,  the 
gifts  of  intellect  above  the  graces  of  character.  She  acquired 


CHAP.  II.]  MRS.   HUTCHINSON.  247 

the  title  of  The  JVonswc/i,  which  the  ingenuity  of  her  admirers 
derived  from  an  anagrammatical  transposition  of  the  letters  of 
her  name  ;  and  gave  to  her  female  assemblies  the  title  of  gos- 
sipings, —  a  term,  at  that  time,  of  respectable  import,  but  which 
the  scandalous  repute  of  female  congregation  and  debate  has 
since  consigned  to  contempt  and  ridicule.  Doing  amiss  what 
the  Scriptures  plainly  forbade  her  to  do  at  all,  she  constituted 
herself  not  only  a  dictator  of  orthodoxy,  but  a  censor  of  the 
spiritual  condition  and  value  of  all  the  ministers  and  inhabitants 
of  the  province.  Her  canons  of  doctrine  were  received  by 
her  associates  as  the  unerring  standard  of  truth  ;  and  a  defam 
atory  persecution  was  industriously  waged  against  all  who  ac 
counted  them  unsound,  uncertain,  or  unintelligible.  A  scrutiny 
was  instituted  into  the  characters  of  all  the  provincial  clergy 
and  laity  ;  and  of  those  who  refused  to  receive  the  doctrinal 
testimony  of  the  conclave,  few  found  it  easy  to  encounter  the 
test  of  a  censorious  inquisition  stimulated  by  female  petulance 
and  controversial  rancor.  In  the  assemblies  which  were  held 
by  the  followers  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  there  was  nourished  and 
trained  a  keen,  contentious  spirit,  and  unbridled  license  of 
tongue,  of  which  the  influence  was  speedily  felt  in  the  serious 
disturbance,  first  of  domestic  happiness,  and  then  of  the  public 
peace.  The  matrons  of  Boston  were  transformed  into  a  synod 
of  slanderous  praters,  whose  inquisitorial  deliberations  and 
audacious  decrees  instilled  their  venom  into  the  innermost  re 
cesses  of  society  ;  and  the  spirits  of  a  great  majority  of  the 
citizens  being  in  that  combustible  state  in  which  a  feeble  spark 
will  suffice  to  kindle  a  formidable  conflagration,  the  whole  col 
ony  was  inflamed  and  distracted  by  the  incontinence  of  female 
spleen  and  presumption.1 

The  tenets  embraced  and  inculcated  by  the  faction  of  which 
Mrs.  Hutchinson  was  the  leader  were  denounced  by  their 
adversaries  as  constituting  the  heresy  of  Antinomianism,  —  a 
charge,  which,  when  preferred  by  the  world  at  large,  indicates 
no  more  than  the  reproach  which  the  gospel,  from  its  first  pro- 

1  "  When  the  minds  of  men  are  full  of  reforming  spirit,  and  predisposed  to 
the  distempers  which  are  engendered  by  such  fulness,  a  little  matter  some 
times  occasions  rather  than  causes  dangerous  symptoms  to  appear."  —  Sir 
James  Mackintosh. 


248  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

mulgation,  has  been  fated  to  sustain,  and  when  advanced  by 
Christians  against  each  other  generally  implies  nothing  else 
than  the  conclusion  which  the  accusers  logically  deduce  from 
certain  articles  of  doctrine,  but  which  the  holders  of  these  ar 
ticles  reject  and  disallow.  Nothing  can  be  more  perfectly  free 
and  gratuitous  than  the  tender  of  heavenly  grace  in  the  gospel ; 
nor  any  thing  more  powerfully  operative  than  the  influence 
which  the  faithful  acceptance  of  this  grace  is  calculated  to  ex 
ercise.  Mrs.  Hutchinson  and  her  adherents  contended  more 
earnestly  for  the  freedom  than  for  the  constraining  influence  of 
divine  grace  ;  and,  with  female  eagerness  and  polemical  im 
petuosity,  were  prompt  and  swift  to  brand  with  terms  of  hereti 
cal  and  contemptuous  designation  every  inhabitant  of  the  colo 
ny,  and  especially  every  minister,  whose  views  did  not  entirely 
coincide  with  their  own.  The  doctrines  which  they  taught, 
and  the  censures  which  they  pronounced,  were  received  with 
avidity  and  delight  by  a  considerable  party ;  and,  proportion 
ally  provoking  the  displeasure  of  others,  excited  the  most  vio 
lent  dissensions  throughout  the  whole  colony.  Cotton  endeav 
oured  to  moderate  the  heats  that  arose,  by  representing  to  the 
parties  that  their  strife  was  prejudicial  to  the  great  purpose  in 
which  he  firmly  believed  the  minds  of  both  were  united,  —  the 
exalting  and  honoring  of  divine  grace  ;  the  one  (said  he)  seek 
ing  to  advance  the  grace  of  God  within  us  in  the  work  of  sanc- 
tification,  the  other  seeking  to  advance  the  grace  of  God  with 
out  us  in  the  work  of  justification.  But  the  strife  was  not 
to  be  stayed  ;  his  endeavours  to  pacify  and  reconcile  only 
attracted  upon  himself  the  fulmination  of  a  censure  of  timorous 
and  purblind  incapacity  from  the  assembly  of  the  women  ; 
and,  as  even  this  insult  was  not  able  to  provoke  him  to  de 
clare  himself  entirely  opposed  to  them,  he  incurred  a  tempo 
rary  abatement  of  his  popularity  with  the  majority  of  the  colo 
nists.  Some  of  the  tenets  promulgated  by  the  sectaries  he 
reverenced  as  the  legitimate  fruit  of  profound  and  perspicuous 
meditation  of  the  Scriptures  ;  but  he  viewed  with  grief  and 
amazement  the  fierce  and  arrogant  spirit  with  which  they  were 
maintained,  and  the  wild  and  dangerous  errors  with  which  they 
were  associated. 

The  controversy  raged  with  a  violence  very  unfavorable  to 


CHAP.  II.]  MRS.  HUTCHINSON.  249 

the  discernment  and  recognition  of  truth.  Mrs.  Hutchinson 
and  her  adherents,  both  male  and  female,  firmly  persuaded  of 
the  superior  soundness  and  purity  of  their  system  of  doctrine, 
forgot  to  consider  how  far  the  opposition  which  it  encountered 
might  be  traced  to  the  obscurity  and  imperfection  with  which 
they  themselves  received  and  proclaimed  it ;  —  a  consideration 
which  no  human  being  is  entitled  to  disregard,  and  which  is 
peculiarly  fitted  to  embellish  superior  attainments  and  promote 
their  efficacy,  by  uniting  them  with  the  amiable  graces  of  can 
dor  and  humility.  The  principles  they  discarded  from  their 
creed  laid  hold  of  their  spirits ;  and  while  they  contended  for 
the  sovereignty  of  divine  grace  in  communicating  truth,  they 
assailed  their  adversaries  with  an  acrimony  and  invective  that 
might  well  seem  to  imply  that  truth  was  easily  and  exclusively 
attainable  by  the  mere  will  and  endeavour  of  men.  The  most 
enlightened  and  consistent  Christian  will  ever  be  the  most 
ready  to  acknowledge  that  he  knows  nothing  yet  as  he  ought  to 
know,  and  may  have  more  cause  than  in  this  life  he  can  ever 
discover  to  blush  for  the  defectiveness  of  a  testimony,  which, 
exhibited  with  more  clearness  and  consistency,  might  have 
found  a  readier  and  more  entire  acceptance  with  mankind. 
But  no  such  considerations  suggested  themselves  to  mitigate 
the  vehemence  ,or  soften  the  asperity  of  those  busy,  bold, 
and  presumptuous  spirits  ;  nor  did  it  ever  occur  to  them  that 
the  doctrines  they  proclaimed  would  be  discredited  by  associa 
tion  with  the  venom  of  untamed,  audacious  tongues.  It  is  as 
serted  that  the  heat  of  their  tempers  gradually  communicated 
itself  to  the  understandings  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson  and  her  party  ; 
and  that — in  addition  to  their  original  tenets,  that  believers  are 
personally  united  with  the  spirit  of  God,  that  commands  to 
work  out  salvation  with  fear  and  trembling  apply  only  to  those 
who  are  under  a  covenant  of  works,  and  that  sanctification  is 
not  the  proper  evidence  of  Christian  condition  —  they  adopted 
that  dangerous  and  erroneous  notion  of  the  Quakers,  that  the 
spirit  of  God  communicates  with  the  minds  of  believers  inde 
pendently  of  the  written  word  ;  and,  in  consistency  with  this, 
received  many  revelations  of  future  events,  announced  to  them 
by  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  as  equally  infallible  with  the  prophecies 
of  Scripture.  But  the  accounts  transmitted  of  such  theologi- 
VOL.  i.  32 


250  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

cal  dissensions  are  always  obscured  by  the  cloud  of  contempo 
rary  passion,  prejudice,  and  error  ;  hasty  effusions  of  irritated 
zeal  are  mistaken  for  deliberate  sentiments  ;  and  the  excesses 
of  .the  zealots  of  a  party  held  up  as  the  standard  by  which 
the  whole  body  may  fairly  be  measured.1 

Some  ministers,  who  espoused  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  opinions, 
began  to  proclaim  them  from  the  pulpit  with  such  opprobrious 
invectives  against  all  by  whom  they  were  rejected,  as  at  length 
brought  the  dissensions  to  a  crisis  ;  and  Vane  being  accounted 
the  confederate  and  protector  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  his  con 
tinuance  in  office,  or  privation  of  it  at  the  approaching  annual 
election,  was  the  first  test  by  which  the  parties  were  to  try 
with  which  of  them  resided  the  power  of  imposing  silence  on 
the  other.  So  much  ill-humor  and  mutual  jealousy  had  now 
been  instilled  into  the  minds  of  the  people,  that  the  utmost  ef 
forts  of  the  sober  and  humane  barely  sufficed  to  prevent  the 
election  from  being  disgracefully  signalized  by  a  general  riot. 
All  the  exertions  of  Vane's  partisans  failed  to  obtain  his  re- 
appointment  ;  and,  by  a  great  majority  of  votes,  Winthrop  was 
chosen  governor.  [May,  1637.]  Vane,  nevertheless,  still  re 
mained  in  Massachusetts,  professing  his  willingness  to  undertake 
even  the  humblest  function  in  the  service  of  a  commonwealth 
composed  of  the  undoubted  people  of  God  ;  and  the  follow 
ers  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  regarding  his  deprivation  of  office  as 
a  dangerous  blow  to  themselves,  ceased  not  to  labor  for  his  re 
instatement  with  as  much  warmth  as  they  had  exerted  for  the 
propagation  of  their  religious  tenets.  The  government  was 
loudly  and  insultingly  vilified,  and  Winthrop  openly  slighted 
and  affronted.  At  length  the  prevailing  party  resolved  to  cut 

1  That  to  a  certain  extent,  however,  the  heresy  which  I  have  particular 
ized  had  crept  in  among  them  seems  undeniably  manifest ;  and  it  is  remark 
able  that  the  notion  which  united  them  with  the  fundamental  tenet  of  the 
Quakers  should  have  issued  from  a  society,  which,  with  farther  resemblance 
to  the  Quakers,  admitted  the  antiscriptural  irregularity  of  female  preaching. 
Captain  Underbill,  one  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  followers,  carried  that  error  to  a 
monstrous  length,  and  combined  with  it  the  grossest  immorality  of  conduct. 
Much  scandal  was  occasioned  by  his  publicly  affirming  that  he  had  received  a 
special  communication  of  his  everlasting  safety  while  he  was  smoking  a  pipe. 
He  was  banished  along  with  his  patroness,  and  a  few  years  after  returned 
to  Boston,  where  he  made  a  public  confession  of  hypocrisy,  adultery,  and  de 
lusion.  Belknap's  History  of  New  Hampshire.  Another  of  Mrs.  Hutchin 
son's  followers  was  a  woman  named  Mary  Dyer,  who  retired  to  Rhode  Island, 
where  she  subsequently  became  a  Quaker.  Winthrop's  Journal  (Savage's 
edition). 


CHAP.  II.]  MRS.  HUTCHINSON.  251 

up  this  source  .of  contention  by  the  roots  ;  and  a  general  synod 
of  the  churches  of  the  colony  having  been  assembled,  the  doc 
trines  recently  broached  were  condemned  as  erroneous  and 
heretical.  As  this  proceeding  served  only  to  provoke  the  pro 
fessors  of  these  doctrines  to  assert  them  with  increased  warmth 
and  pertinacity,  the  leaders  of  the  party  were  summoned  before 
the  General  Court.  Mrs.  Hutchinson  rebuked  her  judges  for 
their  wicked  persecution  of  truth,  compared  herself  to  the 
prophet  Daniel  cast  into  the  den  of  lions,  and  attempted  to 
complete  the  similitude  by  exercising  what  she  believed  to  be 
the  gift  of  prophecy,  and  predicting  that  her  exile  would  be  at 
tended  with  the  ruin  of  her  adversaries  and  all  their  posterity.1 
To  this  punishment,  nevertheless,  she  was  condemned,  together 
with  her  brother,  Wheelwright,  who  was  a  clergyman,  and  had 
been  the  chief  pulpit-champion  of  her  doctrines  ;  and  some  of 
the  inferior  members  of  the  faction,  partly  on  account  of  the 
violence  with  which  they  still  proclaimed  their  theological  ten 
ets,  and  partly  for  the  seditious  insolence  with  which  they  had 
treated  the  new  governor,  were  fined  and  disfranchised.  In 
consequence  of  these  proceedings,  Vane  quitted  the  colony 
and  returned  to  .England,  "leaving  a  caveat,"  says  Cotton 
Mather,  "  that  all  good  men  are  not  fit  for  government."  2 

From  the  unpleasing  contemplation  of  these  religious  dissen 
sions,  we  turn  to  the  more  agreeable  survey  of  some  of  the 
consequences  which  attended  their  issue.  A  considerable  num- 

1  Her  presumption  was  signally  punished.     The  ruin  she  predicted  as  the 
consequence  of  ner  exile  fell  on  herself  and  her  family.     She  went  to  Rhode 
Island  ;    but  not  liking  that  situation,  removed  to  one  of  the  Dutch  settle 
ments,  where  she  and  all  her  family  were  murdered  by  the  Indians.     Before 
she  quitted  Massachusetts,  she  published  a  disclamation  of  some  of  the  er 
roneous  tenets  which  were  imputed  to  her ;  but  maintained  (in  the  face  of 
the  clearest  evidence  to  the  contrary)  that  she  had  never  entertained  them. 
This  was  considered  a  proof  of  dissimulation.     Perhaps  it  might  rather  have 
warranted  the  inference,  that  the  visionary  and  violent  spirit  which  had  laid 
hold  of  her  had  departed  or  subsided,  and  that  she   no  longer  recognized  the 
opinions,  which,  through  its  medium,  formerly  presented  themselves   to  her 
imagination. 

2  Mather.     Neal.     Hutchinson.     Milton  differed  from  Mather  in  his  esti 
mate  of  Vane's  capacity.     His  fine  sonnet  to  him  begins  thus  :  — 

"  Vane,  young  in  years,  but  in  sage  counsels  old, 
Than  whom  a  better  senator  ne'er  held 
The  helm  of  Rome." 
And  ends  thus  :  — 

"  Therefore  on  thy  right  hand  Religion  leans, 
And  reckons  thee  in  chief  her  eldest  son." 


252  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

her  of  persons,  dissatisfied  with  the  policy  and  conduct  of  the 
synod  and  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  voluntarily  for 
sook  the  colony  ;  some  of  these  united  themselves  with  Roger 
Williams  and  his  friends  at  Providence  ;  and  being  soon  after 
abandoned  by  Mrs.  Hutchinson,  they  fell  under  the  guidance 
of  that  meliorated  spirit  which  Williams  now  began  to  display. 
By  a  transaction  with  the  Indians,  these  associated  exiles  ac 
quired  the  property  of  a  fertile  island  in  Narraganset  Bay,  which 
obtained  the  name  of  Rhode  Island.1  Williams  remained 
among  them  upwards  of  forty  years,  respected  as  the  father 
and  director  of  the  colony,  of  which  he  was  several  times 
elected  governor.  In  the  year  1643,  he  made  a  journey  to 
England,  and,  aided  by  the  interest  of  Sir  Henry  Vane,  obtained 
and  conveyed  to  his  fellow-colonists  a  parliamentary  charter,  by 
which  Providence  and  Rhode  Island  were  politically  united  till 
the  Restoration.  Others  of  the  exiles,  under  the  guidance  of 
Wheelwright,  betook  themselves  to  the  northeast  parts  of  New 
England,  and,  being  joined  by  associates  who  were  allured  by 
the  prospects  of  rich  fisheries  and  an  advantageous  beaver 
trade,  they  gradually  formed  and  peopled  the  provinces  of  New 
Hampshire  and  Maine.  These  provinces  had  been  respec 
tively  purchased  from  the  Council  of  Plymouth  by  Mason  and 
Gorges,  who  made  sundry  ineffectual  attempts  to  colonize  their 
acquisitions  with  advantage  to  themselves.  Mason  and  Gorges 
were  actuated  by  views  widely  different  from  those  which 
prevailed  in  general  among  the  colonists  of  New  England  ; 
they  wished  to  become  the  proprietaries  or  hereditary  chiefs 
of  vast  manors  and  seigniories,  and  to  establish  in  America  the 
very  institutions  from  which  emigrants  to  America  were  gen 
erally  seeking  to  escape.  They  found  it  impracticable  to  ob- 

1  The  price  paid  to  the  Indians  was  fifty  fathoms  of  white  beads,  ten  coats, 
and  twenty  shoes.  Chalmers.  "  When  a  fourth  part  of  a  township  of  the 
common  size  was  sold  by  one  Englishman  to  another  for  a  wheelbarrow,  it 
will  be  easily  believed  that  it  was  of  still  less  value  to  the  aborigines.  To 
the  Indians,  without  an  English  purchaser,  the  land  was  often  worth  nothing ; 
and  to  the  colonist,  its  value  was  created  by  his  labor."  Dwight's  Travels. 
"  At  Rhode  Island,  the  settlers,  in  March,  1638,  subscribed  the  following  civil 
compact :  —  '  We,  whose  names  are  underwritten,  do  hereby  solemnly,  in  the 
presence  of  Jehovah,  incorporate  ourselves  into  a  body  politic  ;  and,  as  he 
shall  help,  will  submit  our  persons,  lives,  and  estates,  to  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ, 
the  King  of  Kings  and  Lord  of  Lords,  and  to  all  the  perfect  and  absolute  laws 
given  in  his  holy  word.'  "  Pitkin's  History  of  America. 


CHAP.  II.]  j         CHARLES  CHAUNCY.  253 

tain  a  revenue  from  the  settlers  in  New  Hampshire  and  Maine, 
or  to  establish  among  them  a  form  of  government  suited  to 
their  own  views.  These  settlers,  composed  partly  of  adven 
turers  from  England,  and  partly  of  exiles  and  voluntary  emi 
grants  from  Massachusetts,  framed  for  themselves  separate 
governments,  to  which  for  a  few  years  they  yielded  a  preca 
rious  obedience  ;  till,  wearied  with  internal  disputes  and  di 
visions,  they  besought  the  protection  of  the  General  Court  of 
Massachusetts,  and  obtained  leave  to  be  included  within  the 
pale  of  its  jurisdiction.1 

A  schism,  akin  to  that  which  Mrs.  Hutchinson  created  in 
Massachusetts,  was  fomented  at  Plymouth  by  one  Samuel  Gor 
ton  ;  but  his  career  in  this  place  was  cut  short  by  a  conviction 
for  swindling.  He  removed  from  Plymouth  to  Rhode  Island, 
where  he  excited  such  disturbance,  that,  even  in  this  commu 
nity,  where  unlimited  toleration  was  professed,  he  was  sen 
tenced  to  be  flogged  and  banished.  Repairing  to  the  plantation 
of  Providence,  he  nearly  involved  the  people  of  this  settlement 
in  a  war  with  the  Indians  ;  but  at  length,  in  compliance  with 
the  entreaty  of  Roger  Williams,  the  government  of  Massachu 
setts  laid  hold  of  him  and  some  of  his  adherents,  and,  after 
subjecting  them  to  a  temporary  imprisonment,  obliged  them  to 
depart  the  country.3  [1638.] 

The  population  of  Massachusetts,  impaired  by  the  various 
drains  from  this  territory  which  we  have  noticed,  was  recruited 
in  the  following  year  by  the  arrival  of  a  fleet  of  twenty  ships 
conveying  three  thousand  emigrants  from  England.  Of  these 
the  most  eminent  and  memorable  person  was  Charles  Chauncy, 
an  English  clergyman,  and  one  of  the  greatest  scholars  and 
theologians  of  his  age.  Flying  from  the  persecution  which  his 
own  generous  but  passionate  temper  provoked  from  the  bigotry 
of  Laud,  he  devoted  himself,  with  the  most  admirable  zeal, 
patience,  industry,  and  success,  to  the  ministry  of  the  gospel, 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson.     Sullivan's  History  of  Maine.     Belknap.     The  prov 
ince  of  Maine  was  thus  denominated  in  honor  of  the   British  queen,  with 
whom  Charles  the  First  received  as  a  dowry  the  revenues  of  a  French  prov 
ince  of  the  same  name.     Sullivan.     Sullivan  has  been  represented  to  me  as 
an  intelligent  man  ;  but  he  is  certainly  not  a  perspicuous  historian. 

2  Gorges's  America  painted  to  the  Life.     Neal.     Gorton  went  to  England, 
and,  during  the  civil  wars,  occasioned  some  trouble  to  the  colony  by  his  com 
plaints  of  the  treatment  which  he  had  undergone. 


254  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

and  the  tuition  of  youth,  in  his  adopted  country.  So  animat 
ing  and  impressive  was  the  Christian  example  he  sustained, 
that  the  church  with  which  he  connected  himself  celebrated, 
on  a  day  of  thanksgiving  to  God,  the  privilege  by  which  they 
were  distinguished  in  obtaining  the  society  and  converse  of 
such  a  man.  Resigning  wealth,  ease,  and  distinction,  he  cheer 
fully  entertained  a  lot  of  penury,  toil,  and  obscurity  ;  and  at 
the  age  of  fourscore,  resisted  all  solicitations  to  repose,  and 
expressed  an  earnest  desire  to  die  in  his  pulpit.  The  same 
year  witnessed  the  foundation  of  an  establishment  calculated 
to  improve  and  preserve  the  moral  condition  of  the  people. 
This  was  Harvard  College  (which  has  subsequently  expanded 
into  Harvard  University),  at  Cambridge,  in  Massachusetts,  the 
first  seminary  of  learning  erected  in  North  America.  So 
highly  prized  were  the  advantages  of  knowledge  and  the  in 
fluence  of  education  by  these  generous  parents  of  American 
society,  that  in  the  year  1636,  while  the  colony,  in  addition  to 
the  feebleness  and  suffering  of  its  infant  condition,  was  strug 
gling  with  the  calamity  of  the  Pequod  War,  the  General  Court 
at  Boston  appropriated  four  hundred  pounds  to  the  erection  of 
a  college  or  academy.  "  For  a  like  spirit,  under  like  circum 
stances,"  says  the  president  and  historian  of  this  institution, 
"history  will  be  searched  in  vain."  The  bequest  of  an  emi 
grant  clergyman,  who  appointed  his  whole  fortune  to  be  applied 
to  the  same  design,  enabled  them  in  the  present  year  to  enrich 
their  country  with  an  establishment  whose  operation  has  proved 
as  beneficial  to  their  posterity,  as  its  institution,  at  this  early 
period  of  their  history,  is  honorable  to  themselves.  In  the 
year  1642,  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts  was  conferred  by 
Harvard  College  on  nine  young  men,  the  first  persons  who 
ever  received  collegiate  honors,  the  growth  of  North  Amer 
ica.1 

1  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Winthrop's  Journal  (Savage's  edition). 
Q,uincy's  History  of  Harvard  University.  For  some  time  the  college  possessed 
but  a  scanty  collection  of  books.  The  efforts  of  the  managers  to  accumulate 
a  library  were  aided  by  considerable  donations  of  books  made  to  them  by  that 
great  and  pious  ecclesiastic,  Archbishop  Usher ;  by  the  celebrated  Non-con 
formist  minister,  Richard  Baxter ;  the  great  Whig  lawyer  and  partisan,  Ser 
geant  Maynard  ;  and  that  distinguished  warrior  and  philosopher,  Sir  Kenelm 
Digby.  This  last  mentioned  benefactor  to  a  Puritan  library  was  himself  a 
Roman  Catholic.  It  is  an  interesting  fact,  and  serves  to  dignify  and  embellish 
the  relationship  between  the  two  countries,  that  many  of  the  most  illustrious 


CHAP.  II.]    VACILLATING  POLICY  OF  CHARLES  I.  255 

The  national  growth  of  the  New  England  societies  was  now 
to  be  left  to  depend  on  their  own  resources  ;  and  the  impulse 
which  had  been  communicated  to  it  by  the  stream  of  emigra 
tion  from  the  parent  state  was  for  a  while  to  cease.  For  some 
time  past,  the  policy  of  the  English  government  in  relation  to 
these  settlements  had  savored  of  fear,  aversion,  and  undecided 
purpose  ;  various  demonstrations  were  made  of  arbitrary  de 
sign  and  tyrannical  encroachment  ;  but,  not  being  steadily 
prosecuted,  they  served  merely  to  keep  the  colonists  united 
by  a  sense  of  common  danger,  and  to  endear  the  institutions 
of  liberty  by  the  destruction  with  which  they  were  ineffectually 
menaced.  The  king,  in  reviewing  his  first  proceedings  towards 
the  emigrants,  seerns  to  have  doubted  pretty  early  the  sound 
ness  of  that  policy  which  had  prompted  so  wide  a  departure 
from  the  general  principles  of  his  administration  ;  the  experi 
ence  of  every  year  tended  to  enhance  his  doubts  ;  and  he 
wavered  some  time  in  irresolute  perplexity  between  his  original 
wish  to  evacuate  England  of  the  Puritans,  and  his  apprehen 
sions  of  the  dangerous  and  increasing  influence  which  their 
triumphant  establishment  in  America  was  visibly  exerting. 
The  success  of  his  politic  devices  appeared  for  a  short  time 
to  answer  all  his  expectations  ;  and  he  seemed  likely  to  pre 
vail  over  the  Puritans  by  the  demonstration  of  a  hollow  good 
will  or  lenity,  suspended  on  the  condition  of  their  abandoning 
the  realm.  A  considerable  portion  of  the  embers  of  Puritan 
and  patriotic  feeling  had  been  removed  from  England,  and 
consigned  to  deserts,  where  as  yet  no  colony  had  been  able  to 
survive  ;  but  they  had  neither  languished  nor  perished  ;  and, 
on  the  contrary,  had  kindled  in  America  a  flame  so  powerful 
and  diffusive,  that  even  distant  England  was  warmed  and  en 
lightened  by  the  blaze.  The  jealous  attention  of  Laud  was 
soon  awakened  to  the  disastrous  issue  of  that  experiment ;  and 
while  he  »evolved  the  means  by  which  its  farther  effects  might 
be  counteracted,  he  maintained  spies  in  New  England,  whose 

men  whom  England  has  ever  produced  contributed  to  lay  the  foundation  of 
civilized  society  in  America.  The  enumeration  of  the  patentees  in  the  Vir 
ginian  charters  includes  almost  every  distinguished  individual  in  England  at 
the  time. 

The  people  of  New  England  have  always  retained  that  generous  zeal  for 
the  cultivation  of  knowledge  which  their  fathers  thus  early  displayed.  In  the 
year  1780,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  an  Academy  of  Arts 
and  Sciences  was  established  at  Boston. 


256  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

reports  increased  his  misgivings,  and  who  courted  his  favor  by 
traducing  the  objects  of  his  dislike.  The  detection  of  this 
correspondence  served  to  animate  the  resentment  and  promote 
the  caution  and  the  union  of  the  colonists. 

So  early  as  the  year  1633,  the  English  government,  inspired 
with  alarm,  made  a  hasty  and  ill-considered  attempt  to  repair 
its  error,  by  issuing  a  proclamation  reprobating  the  designs  that 
prompted  emigration  to  New  England,  and  ordering  all  ships 
that  were  ready  to  proceed  thither  with  passengers  to  be  de 
tained.  It  was  soon  perceived  that  this  measure  was  prema 
ture,  and  that  the  only,  or  at  least  the  most  certain,  consequence 
of  it  would  be  to  inflame  the  impatience  of  the  Puritans  to 
obtain,  either  at  home  or  abroad,  the  institutions  which  they  had 
made  preparation  to  establish  and  enjoy.  Not  only  was  the 
proclamation  suffered  to  remain  unexecuted,  but  even,  at  a  later 
period,  Charles  reverted  so  far  to  his  previous  policy  as  to 
promote,  by  his  own  interposition,  the  expatriation  of  young 
Vane,  of  whose  political  and  religious  sentiments  he  was  per 
fectly  well  informed.  After  an  interval  of  hesitation,  measures 
more  deliberate  were  adopted  for  subverting  the  system  of 
liberty  that  had  been  established  in  the  provincial  territory. 
In  the  year  1635,  a  commission  was  granted  to  the  great 
officers  of  state  and  some  of  the  nobility  for  the  regulation 
and  government  of  the  American  plantations.  By  this  com 
mission  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  (Laud)  and  a  few  other 
distinguished  associates  were  authorized  to  make  laws  and  con 
stitutions  for  the  colonists  of  New  England  ;  to  establish  an 
order  of  clergy,  and  assign  them  a  maintenance  ;  and  to  punish 
capitally,  or  otherwise,  all  who  should  violate  their  ordinances. 
The  same  persons,  in  conjunction  with  a  more  numerous  body 
of  commissioners,  were  directed  to  examine  all  existing  colo 
nial  patents  and  charters,  and,  if  they  found  that  any  had  been 
unduly  obtained,  or  that  the  liberties  they  conferred  *were  hurt 
ful  to  the  prerogative  royal,  to  cause  them  to  be  revoked  and 
quashed.  The  English  Grand  Council  of  New  Plymouth  were 
easily  persuaded  to  give  the  first  example  of  submission  to  this 
arbitrary  authority  ;  and  accordingly  surrendered  their  useless 
patent  to  the  king,  under  reservation  of  their  claims  as  private 
individuals  to  the  property  of  the  soil.  These  reserved  claims 


CHAP.  II.]  RESTRAINTS  ON  EMIGRATION.  257 

gave  occasion  at  an  after  period  to  much  dispute,  perplexity, 
and  inconvenience.  The  only  proceeding,  however,  which 
immediately  ensued  against  the  New  England  colonists,  was 
the  institution  of  a  process  of  quo  warranto  against  their  char 
ter  in  the  Court  of  King's  Bench,  of  which  no  intimation  was 
given  to  the  parties  interested,  and  which  was  never  prosecuted 
to  a  judicial  issue. 

It  is  vain  to  speculate  on  all  the  fluctuating  motives  and 
purposes  that  from  time  to  time  guided  and  varied  the  policy 
of  the  king.  He  was  formed  to  hate  and  dread  alike  the 
growth  of  religious  and  political  freedom  ;  but  fated  to  render 
the  highest  service  to  the  objects  of  his  aversion  by  an  ill-di 
rected  and  unavailing  hostility.  In  the  year  1637,  he  granted 
a  commission  to  Sir  Ferdinando  Gorges,  appointing  him  gov 
ernor-general  of  New  England,  and  issued  a  proclamation  pro 
hibiting  all  persons  from  transporting  themselves,  or  others,  to 
that  country,  without  a  special  permission  under  the  great  seal, 
—  which,  it  was  added,  would  be  granted  to  none  who  could 
not  produce  credible  certificates  of  their  having  taken  the  oaths 
of  supremacy  and  allegiance,  and  of  their  having  fully  con 
formed  to  the  ritual  and  ordinances  of  the  church  of  England. 
But  the  critical  state  of  affairs  in  Britain  prevented  the  adop 
tion  of  measures  requisite  to  give  effect  to  Gorges 's  commis 
sion  ;  and  the  irresistible  impatience  of  the  oppressed  Puritans 
and  votaries  of  liberty  to  escape  from  the  increasing  heat  of 
persecution,  or  the  approach  of  civil  war,  completely  defeated 
the  restrictions  imposed  on  their  emigration.  We  have  seen, 
that,  in  the  year  1638,  a  numerous  transportation  of  additional 
emigrants  took  place.  But  before  the  close  of  that  year, 
the  king  gave  way  to  a  singleness  and  obstinate  directness  of 
purpose  which  now  alone  was  wanting  to  assure  and  acceler 
ate  his  ruin  ;  and  after  a  long  course  of  wavering  policy  and 
unsuccessful  experiment,  he  adopted  a  measure,  which,  unfor 
tunately  for  himself,  was  effectual. 

Learning  that  another  fleet  was  preparing  to  sail  for  New 
England  with  a  band  of  emigrants,  among  whom  were  some  of 
the  most  eminent  leaders  of  the  patriots  and  Puritans,  he 
caused  an  order  of  council  to  be  issued  for  its  detention  ;  and 
the  injunction  being  promptly  enforced,  the  intended  voyage 

VOL.  i.  33 


258  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

was  prevented.  On  board  this  fleet  there  appear  to  have  been, 
among  other  distinguished  individuals,  Hazlerig,  Hampden, 
Pym,  and  Oliver  Cromwell,1  —  men  to  whom,  but  a  few. years 
after,  Charles  was  fain  to  tender  the  highest  offices  in  his  realm, 
and  whom  his  blind  injustice  now  detained  to  avenge  the  tyran 
ny  by  which  so  many  of  their  friends  had  been  driven  away. 
Various  proclamations  were  issued  the  same  year  for  the  pre 
vention  of  emigration  to  New  England,  which,  accordingly, 
from  this  time  was  for  many  years  discontinued.2  These 
measures  inflamed  to  the  highest  pitch  the  discontent  that  had 
long  rankled  in  the  minds  of  a  great  body  of  the  people.  Even 
the  hospitality  of  rude  deserts,  it  was  declared,  was  denied  to 
the  oppressed  inhabitants  of  England  ;  and  men  were  constrain 
ed  to  inquire  if  the  evils  which  could  not  be  evaded  might  not 
be  repelled,  and,  since  retreat  was  impracticable,  if  resistance 
might  not  be  availing.  By  promoting  emigration  at  first,  the  king 
opened  a  vein  which  it  was  impossible  to  close,  without  incurring 
considerable  danger  ;  and  the  increased  severity  of  his  adminis 
tration  augmented  the  flow  of  evil  humors  at  the  very  time  when 
he  thus  imprudently  deprived  them  of  their  accustomed  vent. 

1  That  Hampden  and  Cromwell  were  on  board  this  fleet,  or  that  they  even 
intended  to  repair  to  America,  has  been  doubted,  but  I  think  without  good 
reason.     Hume  (contrary  to  his  own  intention)  has  rather  confirmed  than  re 
moved  the  doubt,  by  the  manner  in  which  he  has  referred  to  a  passage  in 
Hutchinson,  the  meaning  of  which  he  has  evidently  misunderstood.     But  Dr. 
Mather,  who  preceded  Hutchinson,  expressly  names  all  the  individuals  men 
tioned  in  the  text  as  having  prepared  for  their  voyage,  and  been  arrested  by 
the  order  of  council.     Oldmixon  recites  the  grant  of  land  in  America  in  favor 
of  Hampden  and  others,  which  the  emigrants  were  proceeding  to  occupy. 
Mather's  statement  is  confirmed  by  NeaT,  Clarendon,  Bates,  and  Dugdale. 
The  strong  mind  of  Cromwell  appears  long  to  have  retained  the  bias  it  had 
once  received  towards  emigration,  and  the  favorable  opinion  of  the  colonists 
of  New  England,  from  which  that  bias  was  partly  derived.     After  the  Remon 
strance  was  voted  in  the  Long  Parliament,  he  told  Lord  Falkland,  that,  if  the 
debate  had  been  attended  with  a  different  result,  he  was  prepared  next  day  to 
have  converted  his  effects  into  ready  money  and  to  quit  the  kingdom.     When 
he  was  invested  with  the  Protectorate,  he  treated  Massachusetts  with  distin 
guished  partiality.     Hume  considered  himself  as  levelling  a  most  sarcastic 
reflection  against  Hampden  and  Cromwell,  when  he  described  them  as  willing 
to  cross  the  Atlantic  Ocean  for  the  sake  of  saying  their  prayers.    Other  writers, 
who  partake  the  political,  but  not  the  religious,  sentiments  of  these  eminent 
persons,  have  been  very  willing  to  defend  them  from  this  imputation. 

Some  historians  have  asserted  that  Hampden  did  actually,  at  one  time,  visit 
North  America ;  and,  doubtless,  in  the  year  1623,  there  was  at  New  Plymouth 
an  Englishman  named  John  Hampden,  whom  Winslow  describes  as  "  a  gen 
tleman  of  London,  who  then  wintered  with  us,  and  desired  much  to  see  the 
country."  —  Belknap's  American  Biography. 

2  Mather.     Neal.    Hutchinson.     Oldmixon.     Chalmers.    Hazard. 


CHAP.  II.]  SURRENDER  OF  THE  CHARTER  REQUIRED.   259 

The  previous  emigration  had  already  drained  the  Puritan  body 
of  a  great  number  of  those  of  its  members  whose  milder  tem 
pers  and  meeker  strain  of  piety  rendered  them  more  desirous 
than  the  generality  of  their  brethren  to  decline  a  contest  with 
their  sovereign  ;  the  present  restrictions  forcibly  retained  in 
the  realm  men  of  more  daring  spirit  and  trained  in  experience 
of  enmity  to  his  person  and  opposition  to  his  measures.1  He 
now  at  last  succeeded  in  stripping  his  subjects  of  every  pro 
tection  that  the  law  could  extend  to  their  rights  ;  and  was  des 
tined  soon  to  experience  how  completely  he  had  divested  them 
of  every  restraint  that  the  law  could  impose  on  the  vindictive 
retribution  of  their  wrongs.  From  this  period  till  the  assem 
bling  of  the  Long  Parliament,  he  pursued  a  short  and  headlong 
career  of  disgrace  and  disaster ;  while  a  gross  infatuation  veiled 
from  his  eyes  the  gulf  of  destruction  to  which  his  steps  were 
advancing. 

In  pursuance  of  the  policy  which  the  king  at  length  deter 
mined  openly  and  vigorously  to  employ,  a  requisition  was 
transmitted  by  the  privy  council  to  the  governor  and  General 
Court  of  Massachusetts,  commanding  them  to  deliver  up  their 
patent,  to  be  conveyed  by  the  first  ship  that  should  sail  for 
England,  in  order  that  it  might  abide  the  issue  of  the  process 
of  quo  warranto  that  was  depending  against  the  colony.  To 
this  requisition  the  General  Court  [September,  1638]  returned 
for  answer  a  humble  and  earnest  petition  that  the  colonists 
might  be  suffered  to  plead  in  their  own  behalf  before  they 
were  condemned.  They  declared  that  they  had  transported 
their  families  to  America,  and  embarked  their  fortunes  in  the 
colonial  project,  in  reliance  on  his  Majesty's  license  and  en 
couragement  ;  that  they  had  never  willingly  or  knowingly  of 
fended  him,  and  now  humbly  deprecated  his  wrath,  and  soli 
cited  to  be  heard  with  their  patent  in  their  hands.  If  it  were 
forcibly  withdrawn  from  them,  they  protested  that  they  must 
either  return  to  England  or  seek  the  hospitality  of  more  distant 

1  The  commencement  of  resistance  in  Scotland  originated  with  some  indi 
viduals  of  that  country  who  had  purchased  a  tract  of  territory  in  New  Eng 
land,  and  made  preparation  to  transport  themselves  thither,  but  were  prevented 
(it  does  not  appear  how)  from  carrying  their  design  into  execution.  They 
had  obtained  from  the  assembly  of  Massachusetts  an  assurance  of  the  free 
exercise  of  their  Presbyterian  form  of  church  government.  —  Mather. 


260  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

regions.  But  they  prayed  that  they  might  "be  suffered  to 
live  in  the  wilderness,"  where  they  had  till  now  found  a  resting- 
place  ;  and  might  experience  in  their  exile  some  of  that  favor 
from  the  ruler  of  their  native  land  which  they  had  largely  ex 
perienced  from  the  Lord  and  Judge  of  all  the  Earth.  They 
retained  possession  of  their  patent  while  they  waited  an  answer 
to  this  petition,  which,  happily  for  their  liberties,  they  were 
destined  never  to  receive.  The  insurrections  which  soon  after 
broke  out  in  Scotland  directed  the  whole  attention  of  the 
king  to  matters  which  more  nearly  concerned  him  ;  and  the 
long  gathering  storm,  which  was  now  visibly  preparing  to  burst 
upon  him  from  every  corner  of  his  dominions,  engaged  him  to 
contract  as  far  as  possible  the  sphere  of  hostility  in  which  he 
found  himself  involved.1  The  benefit  of  his  altered  views 
was  experienced  by  the  Virginians,  in  the  abolition  of  the 
despotism  to  which  he  had  previously  subjected  them  ;  and  by 
the  inhabitants  of  New  England,  in  the  cessation  of  his  at 
tempts  to  supersede  by  a  similar  despotism  the  liberal  institu 
tions  which  they  had  hitherto  enjoyed.  He  would  doubtless 
now  have  readily  consented  to  disencumber  himself  of  some 
of  his  domestic  adversaries  by  promoting  the  emigration  which 
of  late  he  so  imprudently  obstructed  ;  but  such  a  revolution  of 
sentiment  had  taken  place  in  England,  and  such  interesting 
prospects  began  to  open  to  the  patriots  and  Puritans  at  home, 
that  the  motives  which  formerly  induced  them  to  migrate  to 
the  New  World  ceased  any  longer  to  prevail. 

When  the  intercourse  which  for  twenty  years  had  subsisted 
between  New  England  and  the  parent  state  was  thus  inter 
rupted,  the  number  of  the  colonists  amounted  to  about  twenty 
thousand  persons,2  or  four  thousand  families,  including  a  hun 
dred  ministers.  The  expenditure  already  incurred  in  equip 
ping  vessels  and  transporting  emigrants  amounted  to  nearly 

1  Hutchinson.   Chalmers.     This  year  (1638)  was  distinguished  by  an  earth 
quake  in  New  England,  which   extended  through  all  the  settlements,  and 
shook  the  ships  in  Boston  harbour  and  the  neighbouring  islands.     The  sound 
of  it  reminded  some  of  the  colonists  of  the  rattling  of  coaches  in  the  streets 
of  London.  —  Winthrop's  Journal.     Trumbull. 

2  Josselyn's  Voyage  to  New  England.     Hutchinson.     Josselyn,  who  visited 
New  England  more  than  once,  was  intrusted  by  (Juarles,  the  poet,  with  some 
of  his  metrical  versions  of  Scripture,  to  be  submitted  to  the  perusal  and  judg 
ment  of  John  Cotton. 


CHAP.  II.]      DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  261 

two  hundred  thousand  pounds,  —  a  prodigious  sum  in  that  age, 
and  which  nothing  but  the  grand  and  unconquerable  principle 
which  animated  the  Puritans  could  have  persuaded  men  to 
expend  on  the  prospect  of  forming  an  establishment  in  a  re 
mote,  uncultivated  desert,  offering  to  its  inhabitants  merely  a 
plain,  unadorned  freedom  and  difficult  subsistence.  When  the 
civil  war  broke  out  in  the  parent  state,  the  colonists  had  already 
founded  fifty  towns  and  villages  ;  they  had  erected  upwards  of 
thirty  churches  and  ministers'  houses  ;  and  combining  with 
their  preponderating  regard  to  the  concerns  of  religion  a  dili 
gent  and  judicious  conduct  of  their  temporal  affairs,  they  had 
improved  their  estates  to  a  high  degree  of  cultivation.  During 
the  first  seven  years  of  the  infancy  of  the  settlement  that  was 
founded  in  1630,  even  subsistence  was  procured  with  difficulty, 
and  trade  was  not  generally  attempted  ; *  but  soon  after  that 
period,  the  people  began  to  extend  their  fishery,  and  to  open 
a  trade  in  lumber,  which  subsequently  proved  the  staple  article 
of  New  England  commerce.  In  the  year  1637,  there  were 
but  thirty  ploughs  in  the  whole  province  of  Massachusetts,  and 
less  than  the  third  of  that  number  in  Connecticut.  The  cul 
ture  of  the  earth  was  generally  performed  with  hoes,  and  was 
consequently  slow  and  laborious.  Every  commodity  bore  a 
high  price.  Though  money  was  extremely  scarce,  the  price 
of  a  good  cow  was  thirty  pounds  ;  Indian  corn  cost  five  shil 
lings  a  bushel ;  labor  and  every  other  useful  commodity  was 
proportionably  dear. 

Necessity  at  first  introduced  what  the  jurisprudence  of  the 
colonists  afterwards  confirmed  ;  and  desiring  to  perpetuate  the 
habits  that  had  proved  so  conducive  to  piety  and  virtue,  they 
endeavoured  by  legislative  enactments  to  exclude  luxury  and 
promote  industry.  When  the  assembling  of  the  Long  Parlia 
ment  opened  a  prospect  of  safety,  and  even  of  triumph  and 
supremacy,  to  the  Puritans  in  England,  many  persons  who  had 
taken  refuge  in  America  returned  to  their  native  country  ;  but 
a  great  majority  of  the  emigrants  had  experienced  so  much  of 
the  substance  and  happiness  of  religious  life  in  the  societies 

1  Yet  in  the  year  1636,  a  ship  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  tons  was  built  at 
Marblehead  by  the  people  of  Salem. —  Collections  of  the  Massachusetts  Histor 
ical  Society. 


262  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

already  formed  within  the  colony,  that  they  felt  themselves 
united  to  New  England  by  stronger  and  nobler  ties  than  any 
that  patriotic  recollections  could  supply  ;  and  resolved  to  abide 
in  the  region  which  their  virtue  had  converted  from  a  wilder 
ness  into  a  garden.  In  these  infant  societies  of  men,  devoted 
to  godliness  and  liberty,  all  hearts  were  strongly  united  by 
community  of  feeling  on  subjects  the  most  interesting  and 
important  ;  the  inhabitants  were  in  general  very  nearly  on  a 
level  in  point  of  temporal  condition  ;  the  connections  of  neigh 
bourhood  operated  as  extended  family  ties  ;  and  the  minds  of 
all  were  warmed  and  invigorated  by  a  primitive  friendliness, 
freedom,  and  simplicity  of  mutual  communication.1  And  yet 
some  indications  of  an  aristocratical  disposition,  arising,  not 
unnaturally,  from  peculiar  circumstances  that  occurred  in  the 
formation  of  the  colonial  settlements,  did  occasionally  manifest 
themselves.  Several  of  the  first  planters,  particularly  Dudley, 
Winthrop,2  Bradford,  Bellingham,  and  Bradstreet,  were  per 
sons  of  ample  fortune  ;  and  besides  the  transportation  of  their 
own  families,  they  had  borne  the  charge  of  transporting  many 
poor  families  who  must  otherwise  have  remained  in  England. 
Others  were  members  of  the  original  body  of  patentees,  and 
had  incurred  expenses  in  the  procurement  of  the  charter,  the 

1  The  following  passage  in  a  sermon  of  Robert  Cushman,  one  of  the  earliest 
ministers  of  New  Plymouth,  is  characteristic  of  this  state  of  society  :  —  "  Re 
member,  brethren,  that  ye  have  given  your  names  and  promises  to  one  an 
other,  here  to  cleave  together.  You  must,  then,  seek  the  wealth  of  one  another, 
and  inquire,  as  David,  How  liveth  such  a  man  ?  how  is  he  clad  ?  how  is  he 
fed  ?  He  is  my  brother,  my  associate,  and  we  ventured  our  lives  together.  Is 
his  labor  harder  than  mine?  surely,  I  will  ease  him.  Hath  he  no  bed  to  lie 
on  ?  I  have  two  ;  I  '11  lend  him  one.  He  is  as  good  a  man  as  I,  and  we  are 
bound  each  to  other ;  so  that  his  wants  must  be  my  wants,  and  his  welfare  my 
welfare."  —  Belknap's  American  Biography. 

*  Winthrop  "  had  not  so  high  an  opinion  of  a  democratical  government  as 
some  other  gentlemen  of  equal  wisdom  and  goodness."  He  remarked  that 
"  the  best  part  of  a  community  is  always  the  least,  and  of  that  best  part  the 
wiser  is  still  less.  Therefore  it  is  written,  Choose  ye  judges,  and  bring  the 
cause  before  the  judge."  Belknap's  American  Biography.  Not  accounting 
superiority  of  wealth  or  of  bodily  accomplishments  (the  only  distinctions  uni 
versally  palpable  to  mankind)  infallible  indications  of  superiority  in  moral 
and  intellectual  worth,  Winthrop  suggests  no  better  success  for  the  ascertain 
ment  and  promotion  of  the  good  and  wise  minority,  than  the  elective  judg 
ment  of  the  less  wise  and  worthy  majority.  Nor  has  a  more  honest  or  ra 
tional  suggestion  been  ever  propounded.  The  greatest  happiness  of  all  might 
and  should  be  the  motive  principle  of  political  institutions  in  communities  of 
men  all  wise  and  good.  But  with  the  actual  imperfection  of  human  intelli 
gence  and  virtue,  we  are  content  to  accept  the  term  (continually  enlarged  by 
human  advancement)  of  the  greatest  happiness  of  the  greatest  number. 


CHAP.  II.]    DOMESTIC  STATE  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  263 

formation  of  the  company,  the  equipment  of  the  first  body  of 
adventurers,  and  the  purchase  of  the  soil  from  the  natives,  of 
which  they  had  now  no  prospect  of  obtaining  reimbursement. 
On  this  class  of  planters  the  chief  offices  of  government  natu 
rally  devolved  during  the  infancy  of  the  settlements,  and  long 
continued  to  be  discharged  by  them  without  other  pecuniary 
recompense  than  presents,  which  were  occasionally  voted  to 
them  by  the  gratitude  of  their  fellow-citizens.  It  was  probably 
owing  to  the  prevalence  of  the  peculiar  sentiments  inspired 
by  the  services  of  these  persons,  that,  in  the  first  General 
Court  which  was  assembled  in  Massachusetts,  the  election  of 
the  governor,  the  appointment  of  all  the  other  officers,  and 
even  the  power  of  legislation,  were  withdrawn  from  the  free 
men,  and  vested  in  the  Council  of  Assistants  ;  and  although  the 
freemen  reclaimed  and  resumed  their  rights  in  the  following 
year,  yet  the  practical  exercise  of  legislation  was  confined  al 
most  entirely  to  the  Council  of  Assistants,  till  the  introduction 
of  the  representative  system  in  the  year  1634.  From  this 
time  the  council  and  the  freemen,  assembled  together,  formed 
the  General  Court,  till  the  year  1644,  when  it  was  arranged 
that  the  governor  and  assistants  should  sit  apart  ;  and  thence 
commenced  the  separate  existence  of  the  democratic  branch 
of  the  legislature,  or  House  of  Representatives.  Elections  were 
conducted  by  ballot,  in  which  the  balls  or  tickets  tendered  by 
the  electors  consisted  of  Indian  beans.1 

Some  notice  of  the  peculiarities  of  jurisprudence  that  al 
ready  prevailed  in  the  various  communities  of  New  England 
will  serve  to  illustrate  the  state  of  society  and  manners  that 
sprung  up  at  first  among  this  singular  people.  By  a  funda 
mental  law  of  Massachusetts  it  was  enacted,  "that  all  strangers 
professing  the  Christian  religion,  who  shall  flee  to  this  country 
from  the  tyranny  of  their  persecutors,  shall  be  succoured  at  the 
public  charge  till  some  provision  can  be  made  for  them." 
Jesuits  and  other  Romish  priests,  however,  were  doomed  to 
banishment,  and,  in  case  of  their  return,  to  death.  This  cruel 
ordinance  was  afterwards  extended  to  Quakers  ;  and  all  per- 

1  Winthrop's  Journal.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Trumbull.  Holmes's 
American  Annals.  (This  is,  perhaps,  the  most  excellent  chronological  digest 
of  its  history  that  any  nation  has  ever  possessed.)  Belknap's  American  Biog 
raphy. 


264  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

sons  were  forbidden,  under  the  severest  penalties,  to  import 
any  of  "  that  cursed  sect,"  or  of  their  writings,  into  the  colo 
ny.  By  what  behaviour  the  Quakers  of  that  age  provoked  so 
much  aversion  and  such  rigorous  treatment  we  shall  have  an 
opportunity  of  considering  hereafter.  An  ordinance  of  the 
General  Court  of  Massachusetts  in  the  year  1637  (prompted  ap 
parently  by  Mrs.  Hutchinson's  schism)  forbade  the  residence 
within  that  colony  of  any  stranger  unprovided  with  the  license 
of  a  provincial  magistrate  ;  but  this  illiberal  ordinance  (which 
was  warmly  combated  by  Henry  Vane)  seems  never  to  have 
obtained  any  practical  efficiency.  These  persecuting  edicts 
had  no  place  in  Rhode  Island,  where  nobody  was  exposed  to 
active  molestation  for  religious  opinions,  and  all  professors  of 
Christianity,  except  Roman  Catholics,  were  admitted  to  the 
full  rights  of  citizenship.  All  persons  were  forbidden  to  run, 
or  even  walk,  "  except  reverently  to  and  from  church,"  on 
Sunday,  or  to  profane  the  day  by  sweeping  their  houses,  cook 
ing  their  victuals,  or  shaving  their  beards.  Mothers  were  even 
commanded  not  to  kiss  their  children  on  that  sacred  day.  The 
usual  punishments  of  great  crimes  were  disfranchisement,  ban 
ishment,  and  temporary  servitude  ;  but  perpetual  slavery  was 
not  permitted  to  be  inflicted  upon  any  persons  except  captives 
lawfully  taken  in  war  ;  and  these  were  to  be  treated  with  the 
gentleness  of  Christian  manners,  and  to  be  entitled  to  all  the 
mitigations  of  their  lot  enjoined  by  the  law  of  Moses.  Dis 
claiming  all  but  defensive  war,  the  colonists  considered  them 
selves  entitled  and  constrained  in  self-defence  to  deprive  their 
assailants  of  a  liberty  which  they  had  abused  and  rendered  in 
consistent  with  the  safety  of  their  neighbours.  The  practice, 
nevertheless,  was  impolitic,  to  say  no  worse,  and  served  to 
pave  the  way,  at  a  later  period,  for  the  introduction  of  negro 
slavery  into  New  England. 

Adultery  was  punished  by  death  ;  and  fornication  by  com 
pelling  the  offending  parties  to  marry  (an  absurd  device,  which 
discredits  the  state  of  marriage),  or  by  fine  and  imprisonment. 
Burglary  and  robbery  were  punished,  for  the  first  offence,  by 
branding  ;  for  the  second,  by  branding  and  flogging  ;  for  the 
third,  by  death  :  but  if  either  of  these  crimes,  while  yet  not  in 
ferring  a  capital  punishment,  were  committed  on  Sunday,  an 


CHAP.  II.]     DOMESTIC  STATE   OF   NEW  ENGLAND.  265 

ear  was  to  be  cut  off  in  addition  to  the  other  inflictions.  We 
must  beware  of  supposing  that  such  penal  enactments  indicate 
the  frequency  or  even  the  actual  occurrence  of  the  crimes  to 
which  they  refer.  In  those  communities  where  civilization  has 
been  a  gradual  attainment,  penal  laws  denote  the  prevalence  of 
the  actions  they  condemn.  But  in  communities  at  once  infant 
and  civilized,  many  of  the  laws  must  be  regarded  merely  as 
the  expression  of  the  opinion  of  the  legislators,  and  by  no 
means  as  indicating  the  actual  condition  of  society.  Blas 
phemy  and  idolatry  were  punishable  by  death  ;  and  though  it 
was  acknowledged  in  the  preamble  to  one  of  the  laws,  "  that 
no  human  power  is  lord  over  the  faith  and  consciences  of 
men,"  yet  heresy,  by  this  very  law,  was  declared  to  infer  ban 
ishment  from  the  province.  Pecuniary  mulcts  were  imposed 
on  every  person  "  observing  any  such  day  as  Christmas." 
Witchcraft  and  perjury,  directed  against  human  life,  were  cap 
itally  punished.  No  capital  charge  was  deemed  capable  of 
being  proved  by  evidence  less  weighty  than  the  oaths  of  two 
witnesses,  —  a  principle  that  deserves  to  be  universally  estab 
lished,  as  well  on  account  of  its  own  intrinsic  rectitude  as  of 
the  sanction  it  received  from  divine  legislation.  By  a  singular 
law,  which,  both  from  its  peculiar  terms  and  from  its  never 
having  been  carried  into  effect,  is  more  discreditable  to  the 
wisdom  of  its  framers  than  to  the  humanity  of  the  people  at 
large,  it  was  enacted,  that,  although  torture  should  not  be  or 
dinarily  inflicted,  yet  a  convicted  criminal,  known  to  have  had 
accomplices,  and  refusing  to  disclose  them,  might  be  subjected 
to  torture,  —  "yet  not  to  such  tortures  as  are  barbarous  and 
inhuman." 

All  gaming  was  prohibited  ;  cards  and  dice  were  forbidden 
to  be  imported  ;  and  assemblies  for  dancing  were  proscribed. 
Public  registers  were  instituted,  in  which  all  the  marriages, 
births,  and  deaths  of  the  colonists  were  recorded.  By  a  law 
enacted  in  1646,  kissing  a  woman  in  the  street,  even  in  the 
way  of  honest  salute,  was  punished  by  flogging,  which  was  not 
considered  an  infamous  punishment  by  the  people  of  Massa 
chusetts.  Even  so  late  as  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  centu 
ry,  there  were  instances  of  persons,  who,  after  undergoing 
public  flagellation,  associated  with  the  most  respectable  cir- 

VOL.  i.  34 


266  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

cles  of  society  in  Boston.  This  doubtless  arose  from  the 
peculiar  character  of  the  government,  which,  seeming  to  hold 
a  patriarchal  relation  to  the  people,  could  never  be  supposed, 
in  correcting  an  offender,  to  divest  itself  entirely  of  respect 
and  good-will  for  him.  The  economy  of  inns  Avas  regulated 
with  a  strictness  which  deserves  to  be  noted,  as  explanatory  of 
a  circumstance  that  has  frequently  excited  the  surprise  of  Eu 
ropean  travellers  in  America.  The  intemperance  and  immo 
rality  to  which  these  places  are  so  often  made  subservient 
was  punished  with  the  utmost  rigor  ;  and  all  innkeepers  were 
required,  under  the  severest  penalties,  to  restrain  the  excesses 
of  their  guests,  or  to  acquaint  the  magistrate  with  their  perpe 
tration.  To  secure  a  stricter  execution  of  this  law,  it  was 
judged  expedient  that  innkeepers  should  be  divested  of  the 
temptation  that  poverty  presents  to  its  infraction,  and  should 
enjoy  such  personal  consideration  as  would  facilitate  the  exer 
cise  of  their  difficult  duty  ;  and,  accordingly,  none  were  per 
mitted  to  follow  this  calling  but  persons  of  approved  character 
and  competent  estate.  One  of  the  consequences  of  this  poli 
cy  has  been,  that  an  employment,  very  little  respected  in  other 
countries,  has  ever  been  creditable  in  New  England,  and  not 
unfrequently  pursued  by  men  who  have  retired  from  honor 
able  stations  in  the  civil  or  military  service  of  the  state. 

Persons  wearing  apparel,  which  the  grand  jury  should  ac 
count  disproportioned  to  then-  fortune,  were  to  be  admonished 
in  the  first  instance,  and,  if  contumacious,  fined.  A  fine  was 
imposed  on  every  woman  cutting  her  hair  like  a  man's,  or  suf 
fering  it  to  hang  loosely  upon  her  face.  Idleness,  lying,  swear 
ing,  and  drunkenness  were  visited  with  various  penalties  and 
marks  of  disgrace.1  The  selectmen  assessed,  in  every  family, 

1  That  these  laws  were  not  permitted  to  be  a  dead  letter  appears  from  the 
following  extracts  from  the  earliest  records  of  the  court  of  Massachusetts. 
"  John  Wedgewood,  for  being  in  the  company  of  drunkards,  to  be  set  in  the 
stocks.  Catharine,  the  wife  of  Richard  Cornish,  was  found  suspicious  of  in- 
continency,  and  seriously  admonished  to  take  heed.  Thomas  Petit,  for  sus 
picion  of  slander,  idleness,  and  stubbornness,  is  sentenced  to  be  severely 
whipped.  Captain  Lovel  admonished  to  take  heed  of  light  carriage.  Josias 
Plaistowe,  for  stealing  four  baskets  of  corn  from  the  Indians,  is  ordered  to  re 
turn  them  eight  baskets,  to  be  fined  five  pounds,  and  hereafter  to  be  called  by 
the  name  of  Josias,  and  not  Mr.,  as  formerly  he  used  to  be."  Hutchinson. 
Few  obtained  the  title  of  Mr.  in  the  colony ;  still  fewer  that  of  Esquire. 
Goodman  and  Goodwife  were  the  common  appellations.  It  was  by  merit  and 
public  services,  rather  than  wealth,  that  the  distinctive  appellations  were 


CHAP.  II.]    DOMESTIC  STATE   OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  267 

the  quantity  of  spinning  which  the  young  women  were  reckoned 
capable  of  producing,  and  enforced  by  fines  the  production  of 
the  requisite  quantities.  Usury  was  forbidden  ;  and  the  pro 
hibition  was  not  confined  to  the  interest  of  money,  but  extend 
ed  to  the  hire  of  laboring  cattle  and  implements  of  husbandry. 
Persons  deserting  the  English  settlements,  and  living  in  heathen 
license  and  profanity,  were  punished  by  fine  and  imprisonment. 
A  male  child  above  sixteen  years  of  age,  accused  by  his  pa 
rents  of  rebellion  against  them  and  general  misconduct,  in 
curred  (conformably  with  the  Mosaic  code)  the  doom  of  capi 
tal  punishment  ;  and  any  person  courting  a  maid,  without  the 
sanction  of  her  parents,  was  fined  and  imprisoned.  Yet  the 
parental  authority  was  not  left  unregulated.  All  parents  were 
commanded  to  instruct  and  catechize  their  children  and  ser 
vants,  whom  the  selectmen  or  overseers  were  directed  to  re 
move  from  their  authority  and  commit  to  fitter  hands,  if  the 
parents  or  masters  were  found  deficient  in  this  duty  ;  and  chil 
dren  were  allowed  to  seek  redress  from  the  magistrate,  if  they 
were  arbitrarily  restrained  from  marriage.  The  celebration  of 
the  nuptial  ceremony  was  confined  to  the  magistrate,  or  such 
other  persons  as  the  General  Court  might  authorize  to  perform 
it.  The  provincial  law  of  tenures  was  exceedingly  simple  and 
concise.  The  charter  had  conveyed  the  territory  to  the  com 
pany  and  its  assigns  ;  and  by  an  early  law  of  the  province, 
it  was  provided,  "  that  five  years'  quiet  possession  shall  be 
deemed  a  sufficient  title."  Instead  of  proclaiming  or  intend 
ing  that  the  deficiencies  of  the  provincial  code  should  be  sup 
plied  by  the  common  or  statute  law  of  England,  it  was  an- 

gained.  Ibid.  The  strictness  and  scrupulosity  of  manners,  affected  by  many  of 
the  inhabitants,  exceeded  the  standard  of  the  laws ;  and  associations  were 
formed  for  suppressing  the  practices  of  drinking  healths,  and  of  wearing  long 
hair  and  periwigs.  Ibid.  In  some  instances,  the  purposes  of  these  associa 
tions  were  afterwards  sanctioned  and  enforced  by  the  laws.  "  They  thought 
the  magistrates,  being  God's  ministers,  were  bound  to  punish  all  offences  in 
their  courts  in  the  same  proportion  as  the  Supreme  Judge  would  punish  them 
in  the  court  of  heaven.  Ibid.  This  notion  frequently  involved  the  magis 
trates  in  most  absurd  and  indecent  inquisitions ;  some  of  which,  to  the  dis 
grace  of  Puritan  jurisprudence,  have  been  preserved  in  Winthrop's  Journal. 
It  is  related  of  some  of  the  earlier  settlers,  that,  with  an  outrageous  exaggera 
tion  of  rigidity,  they  refrained  from  brewing  on  Saturday,  because  the  beer 
would  work  upon  Sunday.  Douglas,  Summary  of  the  British  Settlements  in 
America.  A  farmer  in  New  Hampshire  found  great  difficulty  in  escaping  ex 
communication  for  having  shot,  on  Sunday,  a  bear  that  was  wasting  his  fields. 
Graham's  Sketch  of  Vermont. 


268  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

nounced,  that,  in  cases  where  redress  of  wrongs  or  remedy  of 
inconvenience  was  not  provided  by  the  ordinances  or  custom 
ary  practice  of  the  province,  recourse  should  be  had  to  the 
pages  of  holy  writ.1 

Like  the  tribes  of  Israel,  the  colonists  of  New  England  had 
forsaken  their  native  land  after  a  long  and  severe  persecution, 
and  journeyed  into  a  wilderness  for  the  sake  of  religion.  Like 
the  Israelites,  they  compared  themselves  to  a  vine  brought  out 
of  Egypt,  and  planted  by  the  Lord  in  a  land  from  which  the 
heathen  were  cast  forth.  They  endeavoured  to  cherish  a  re 
semblance  of  condition,  so  honorable  and  so  fraught  with  in 
citements  to  piety,  by  cultivating  a  conformity  between  their 
laws  and  customs  and  those  which  distinguished  the  ancient 
people  of  God.  Hence  arose  some  of  the  peculiarities  which 
we  have  observed  in  their  legislative  code  ;  and  hence  arose 
also  the  practice  of  commencing  their  sabbatical  observances 
on  Saturday  evening.  The  same  predilection  for  Jewish  cus 
toms  begot,  or  at  least  promoted,  among  them  the  habit  of 
bestowing  significant  names  on  children,  of  whom  the  first 
three  that  were  baptized  in  Boston  church  received  the  names 
of  Joy,  Recompense,  and  Pity.  This  custom  seems  to 
have  obtained  the  greatest  prevalence  in  the  town  of  Dor 
chester,  which  long  continued  to  be  remarkable  for  such  names 
as  Faith,  Hope,  Charity,  Deliverance,  Dependence,  Preserved, 
Content,  Prudence,  Patience,  Thankful,  Hate-evil,  Holdfast, 
and  others  of  a  similar  character.2 

1  Abridgment  of  the  Ordinances  of  New  England,  apud  Neal.  Hutchinson. 
Trumbull.  Josselyn.  Burnaby's  Travels  in  America.  Chalmers.  Winthrop's 
Journal.  Holmes's  Account  of  the  Blue  IMWS  of  Connecticut,  in  the  Rhode 
Island  Farmers'  and  Manufacturers'  Journal.  The  primitive  rigidity  discern 
ible  in  some  of  these  laws  was  tempered  by  a  patriarchal  mildness  of  admin 
istration.  Many  instances  of  this  occur  in  Mather's  Lives  of  the  Governors  of 
New  England.  One  I  may  be  permitted  to  notice  as  a  specimen.  Governor 
Winthrop,  being  urged  to  prosecute  and  punish  a  man  who  pillaged  his  maga 
zine  of  firewood  in  winter,  declared  he  would  soon  cure  him  of  that  mal 
practice  ;  and,  accordingly,  sending  for  the  delinquent,  he  told  him,  "  You 
have  a  large  family,  and  I  have  a  large  magazine  of  wood  ;  come  as  often  to 
it  as  you  please,  and  take  as  much  of  it  as  you  need  to  make  your  dwelling 
comfortable."  —  "And  now,"  he  added,  turning  to  his  friends,  "I  defy  him 
to  steal  my  firewood  again." 

8  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  America. 


CHAP.  III.]   NEW  ENGLAND  SIDES  WITH  PARLIAMENT.    269 


CHAPTER    III. 

New  England  embraces  the  Cause  of  the  Parliament.  —  Federal  Union  be 
tween  the  New  England  States.  — Provincial  Coinage  of  Money.  —  Disputes 
occasioned  by  the  Disfranchisement  of  Dissenters  in  Massachusetts.  —  Im 
peachment  and  Trial  of  Governor  Winthrop.  —  Arbitrary  Proceedings 
against  the  Dissenters.  —  Attempts  to  convert  and  civilize  the  Indians.  — 
Character  and  Labors  of  Eliot  and  Mayhew.  —  Indian  Bible  printed  in 
Massachusetts.  —  Effects  of  the  Missionary  Labor.  —  A  Synod  of  the  New 
England  Churches.  —  Dispute  between  Massachusetts  and  the  Long  Par 
liament.  —  The  Colony  foils  the  Parliament  —  and  is  favored  by  Cromwell. 
—  The  Protector's  Administration  beneficial  to  New  England.  —  He  con 
quers  Acadia.  —  His  Propositions  to  the  Inhabitants  of  Massachusetts  —  de 
clined  by  them.  —  Persecution  of  the  Anabaptists  in  Massachusetts.  —  Con 
duct  and  Sufferings  of  the  Quakers.  — The  Restoration.  —  Address  of  Mas 
sachusetts  to  Charles  the  Second.  —  Alarm  of  the  Colonists  —  their  Declara 
tion  of  Rights.  —  The  King's  Message  to  Massachusetts  —  how  far  complied 
with.  —  Royal  Charter  of  Incorporation  to  Rhode  Island  and  Providence  — 
and  to  Connecticut  and  New  Haven. 

THE  coincidence  between  the  principles  of  the  New  Eng 
land  colonists  and  those  of  the  prevailing  party  in  the  Long 
Parliament  [1641]  was  cemented  by  the  consciousness,  that 
with  the  success  of  this  party  was  identified  the  security  of 
the  provincial  institutions  from  the  dangers  that  had  so  recent 
ly  menaced  them.  As  soon  as  the  colonists  were  informed 
of  the  convocation  of  that  famous  assembly,  they  despatched 
Hugh  Peters  and  two  other  persons  to  promote  their  interests 
in  the  parent  state.  The  mission  proved  more  fortunate  for 
New  England  than  for  her  ambassadors.  By  an  ordinance  of 
the  House  of  Commons  l  in  the  following  year,  the  inhabitants 
of  all  the  various  plantations  of  New  England  were  exempted 
from  payment  of  any  duties,  either  upon  goods  carried  thither, 
or  upon  goods  imported  by  them  into  the  mother  country, 
"  until  the  House  shall  make  further  order  therein  to  the  con- 

1  The  reasons  assigned  by  the  House  for  this  ordinance  are,  that  the  planta 
tions  of  New  England  are  likely  to  conduce  to  the  propagation  of  the  gospel, 
and  already  "  have,  by  the  blessing  of  the  Almighty,  had  good  and  prosperous 
success,  without  any  public  charge  to  the  state." 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

trary."  The  colonists,  in  return,  cordially  embraced  the  cause 
of  their  benefactors  ;  and  when  the  civil  wars  broke  out  in 
England  [1642],  they  published  a  decree  expressive  of  their 
approbation  of  the  measures  of  parliament,  and  denouncing 
capital  punishment  against  all  persons  who  should  disturb  the 
peace  of  the  commonwealth  by  endeavouring  to  raise  a  party 
for  the  king  of  England,  or  by  discriminating  between  the 
king  and  the  parliament,  which  pursued  (it  was  declared)  the 
true  interests  of  the  king  as  well  as  its  own.  Happily  for 
themselves,  the  colonists  were  unable  to  signalize  their  predi 
lection  by  more  active  interference  in  the  contest  ;  and,  with 
a  prudent  regard  to  their  commercial  interests,  they  gave  free 
ingress  into  their  harbours  to  trading  vessels  from  the  ports  in 
possession  of  the  royalists.  They  had  likewise  the  good  sense 
to  decline  an  invitation  they  received  to  depute  John  Cotton, 
and  others  of  their  ministers,  to  attend,  as  provincial  delegates, 
the  celebrated  Assembly  of  Divines  convoked  at  Westminster. 
Encouraged  by  the  privileges  that  were  conferred  on  them, 
they  pursued  the  cultivation  of  their  soil  with  unremitting  ar 
dor  ;  and  their  wealth  and  population  rapidly  increased.  Front 
the  continent  they  began  to  extend  their  occupation  to  the  ad 
jacent  islands  ;  and  one  planter,  in  particular,  having  obtained 
a  grant  of  Martha's  Vineyard,  Nantucket,  and  the  Elizabeth 
Islands,  laid  the  foundation  there  of  settlements  that  afterwards 
proved  highly  serviceable  to  the  conversion  and  civilization  of 
the  Indians.  But  a  contemporaneous  attempt  which  they  made 
to  extend,  if  not  their  settlements,  at  least  their  principles,  in 
another  quarter  of  the  continent,  was  attended  with  unfortunate 
results.  The  colonists  of  Virginia  were  in  general  stanch 
royalists  ;  and,  with  little  concern  for  the  substance  of  re 
ligion,  professed  a  strong  attachment  to  the  forms  and  insti 
tutions  of  the  church  of  England.  Yet,  as  we  have  seen,  they 
received,  even  as  early  as  the  reign  of  James,  an  accession 
to  their  numbers,  composed  of  persons  who  had  imbibed  Pu 
ritan  sentiments,  and  were  fugitives  from  ecclesiastical  perse 
cution  in  Britain.  A  deputation  from  this  class  of  the  Vir 
ginian  planters  had  been  lately  sent  to  Boston  to  represent  their 
destitution  of  proper  ministers,  and  solicit  a  supply  of  pastors 
from  the  New  England  churches.  In  compliance  with  this 


CHAP.  III.]    PLOT  OF  THE  NARRAGANSET  INDIANS.        271 

request,  three  clergymen  were  selected  to  repair  as  missionaries 
to  Virginia,  and  furnished  with  recommendatory  letters  from  the 
governor  of  Massachusetts  to  Sir  William  Berkeley.  [1642.] 
On  their  arrival  in  Virginia,  they  began  to  preach  in  various 
parts  of  the  country,  and  the  people  flocked  to  hear  them  with 
an  eagerness  that  might  have  been  productive  of  important 
consequences.  But  the  Puritan  principles,  as  well  as  the 
political  sentiments,  of  the  colonists  of  New  England  were  too 
much  the  objects  of  aversion  to  Sir  William  Berkeley,  to  ad 
mit  of  his  patronage  being  afforded  to  an  enterprise  intended 
and  adapted  to  propagate  their  influence  among  his  own  people. 
So  far  from  complying  with  the  desire  of  his  brother  governor, 
he  issued  a  proclamation,  by  which  all  persons  who  would  not 
conform  to  the  ceremonial  of  the  church  of  England  were  com 
manded  straightway  to  depart  from  Virginia.  The  preachers 
accordingly  returned  to  New  England  ;  and  thus  was  laid  the 
foundation  of  a  jealousy  which  long  subsisted  between  the  two 
oldest  provinces  of  North  America.1 

The  disappointment  occasioned  by  this  fruitless  attempt  to 
establish  a  friendly  connection  with  the  sister  colony  of  Vir 
ginia  was  counterbalanced  in  the  following  year  [1643]  by  an 
important  event  in  the  history  of  the  New  England  settlements  ; 
—  the  formation  of  a  league  by  which  they  were  knit  together 
in  a  federal  union  that  greatly  augmented  their  security  and 
power.  The  Narraganset  Indians  had  by  this  time  reflected  at 
leisure  on  the  policy  of  their  conduct  towards  the  Pequods  ; 
and  the  hatred  which  they  formerly  cherished  against  this  tribe, 
being  extinguished  in  the  destruction  of  its  objects,  was  suc 
ceeded  by  an  angry  jealousy  of  those  strangers  who  obviously 
derived  the  chief  and  only  lasting  advantage  which  the  conflict 
had  yielded.  They  saw  the  territories  of  their  ancient  rivals 
occupied  by  a  much  more  formidable  neighbour ;  and  mistaking 
their  own  inability  to  improve  their  condition  for  the  effect  of 
fraud  and  injustice  on  the  part  of  the  colonists,  who  were 
rapidly  surpassing  them  in  number,  wealth,  and  power,  they 
began  to  complain  that  the  plunder  of  the  Pequods  had  not 
been  fairly  divided,  and  concerted  measures  with  some  of  the 

1  Hutchinson.     Neal.     Hazard. 


272  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

neighbouring  tribes  for  a  general  insurrection  of  the  Indians 
against  the  English.  Their  designs  had  advanced  but  a  little 
way  towards  maturity,  when  they  were  detected,  in  consequence 
of  an  emergent  quarrel  with  another  tribe,  which  they  pursued 
with  an  imprudent  indulgence  of  that  inordinate  appetite  for 
present  revenge  which  seemed  fated  to  disconcert  and  defeat 
their  political  views.  The  colonists,  from  the  groundless  mur 
murs  they  found  themselves  exposed  to,  and  which  proved  only 
the  rooted  dislike  of  the  savages,  were  sensible  of  their  own 
danger,  without  yet  being  aware  of  its  extent,  or  feeling  them 
selves  authorized  to  anticipate  by  defensive  hostility  some  more 
certain  indication  of  it ;  when,  fortunately,  they  were  invited  to 
act  as  mediators  between  two  contending  tribes.  The  Narra- 
gansets,  having  conceived  some  disgust  against  a  neighbouring 
chief,  employed  an  assassin  to  kill  him  ;  and,  failing  in  this 
attempt,  plunged  into  a  war,  with  the  declared  intention  of 
exterminating  the  whole  of  his  tribe.  This  tribe,  who  were  at 
peace  with  the  English,  implored  the  protection  of  the  Massa 
chusetts  government,  which  agreed  to  interpose  in  their  behalf. 
The  Narragansets,  apprized  of  this  transaction,  recollecting  the 
terrible  punishment  inflicted  on  the  Pequods,  and  conscious 
that  they  themselves  justly  merited  a  similar  visitation,  were 
struck  with  dismay,  and,  throwing  down  their  arms,  acceded  to 
a  treaty  of  peace  dictated  to  them  by  the  English.  When  their 
immediate  apprehensions  subsided,  they  showed  so  little  regard 
to  the  performance  of  their  paction,  that  it  was  not  till  the  colo 
nists  made  a  demonstration  of  readiness  to  employ  force  that 
they  sullenly  fulfilled  it. 

Alarmed  by  such  indications  of  fickleness,  dislike,  and  furi 
ous  passion,  and  ascertaining  by  dint  of  inquiry  the  design  that 
had  been  recently  proposed  and  entertained  of  a  general  con 
spiracy  of  the  Indians,  —  the  authorities  of  Massachusetts  con 
ceived  the  defensive  project  of  providing,  by  a  mutual  concert 
of  the  colonies,  for  the  common  danger  which  they  might  ex 
pect  to  encounter  at  no  distant  day,  when  the  savages,  in 
structed  by  experience,  would  sacrifice  their  private  feuds  to 
combined  hostility  against  a  race  of  strangers  whose  progressive 
advancement  seemed  to  minister  occasion  of  increasing  and  in 
curable  jealousy  to  the  whole  Indian  race.  Having  composed, 


CHAP.  HI.]      THE  NEW  ENGLAND  CONFEDERACY.  273 

for  this  purpose,  a  plan  which  was  framed  in  imitation  of  the 
bond  of  union  between  the  Dutch  provinces,  and  which  readily 
suggested  itself  to  some  leading  personages  among  the  colonists 
who  had  resided  with  the  Brownist  congregation  in  Holland, 
they  communicated  it  to  the  neighbouring  settlements  of  New 
Plymouth,  Connecticut,  and   New    Haven,  by  which   it  was 
cordially  embraced.     These  four  colonies,  accordingly,  entered 
into  a  league  of  perpetual  confederacy,  offensive  and  defensive. 
[May  19,  1643.]      The  instrument  of  confederation  between 
them  announced  that  their  respective  inhabitants  had  all  come 
into  these  parts  of  America  with  the  same  errand  and  aim,  to 
advance  the  Christian  religion,  and  enjoy  the  liberty  of  their 
consciences  with  purity  and  peace.     It  was  stipulated,  that  the 
confederates  should  thenceforth  be  distinguished  by  the  title  of 
The  United  Colonies  of  New  England  ;   that  each  province 
should  remain  a  separate  and  distinct  municipal  association,  and 
retain  independent  jurisdiction  within  its  own  territory  ;  that  in 
every   war,  offensive  or  defensive,  each  of  the  confederates 
should  furnish  its  quota  of  men,  money,  and  provisions,  at  a 
rate  to  be  fixed  from  time  to  time  in  proportion  to  the  popula 
tion  of  the  respective  communities  ;  that  a  council,  composed 
of  two  commissioners  from  each  province,  should  be  annually 
convoked  and  empowered  to  deliberate  and  decide  on  all  points 
of  common  concern  to  the  confederacy  ;  and  that  every  resolve, 
sanctioned  by  the  approbation  of  six  of  the  commissioners, 
should  be  binding    on    all   the    associated    provinces.     Every 
province  renounced  the  right  of  protecting  fugitive  debtors  or 
criminals  from  the  legal  process  of  the  particular  community 
which  they  might  have  wronged  and  deserted.      The  State  of 
Rhode  Island,  which  was  not    included  in  this   confederacy, 
petitioned  a  few  years  after  to  be  admitted  into  it ;  but  her  re 
quest  was  refused,  except  on  the  condition,  which  she  declined, 
of  merging  her  separate  existence  in  an  incorporation  with  the 
colony  of  New  Plymouth.     Thus  excluded  from  the  benefit  of 
the  federal  union,  and  in  a  manner  dissociated  from  the  other 
States,  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island  and  Providence  en 
deavoured   to  promote  their  separate  security  by  conciliating 
the  friendship  of  the  Indians ;  and  the  humane  and  courteous 
VOL.  i.  35 


274  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

policy  which  this  purpose  taught  them  to  pursue  proved  re 
markably  successful.1 

The  colonists  have  been  reproached  with  arrogating  the  pre 
rogative  of  sovereignty  in  this  transaction,  —  which,  doubtless, 
wears  all  the  features  of  a  direct  approach  to  political  inde 
pendence.  Yet  it  was  a  measure  that  could  hardly  be  avoided 
by  a  people  surrounded  with  enemies,  and  abandoned  to  their 
own  guidance  and  resources,  in  a  territory  many  thousand 
miles  distant  from  the  seat  of  the  government  that  claimed 
supreme  dominion  over  them.  Of  a  community  so  situated 
every  progressive  step  in  social  advancement,  whether  consist 
ing  in  the  enlargement  of  its  numbers  or  the  concentration  of 
its  resources,  or  otherwise  tending  to  increase  its  power  and 
promote  its  security,  was  a  step  towards  national  independence. 
Nothing  but  some  curiously  politic  system,  or  such  a  series  of 
events  as  might  have  kept  the  various  settlements  continually 
disunited  in  mutual  jealousy  and  consequent  weakness,  could 
have  secured  their  protracted  existence  as  a  dependent  progeny 
of  England.  But  whatever  effects  the  transaction  which  we 
have  remarked  may  have  silently  produced  on  the  course  of 
American  sentiment  and  opinion,  and"  however  likely  it  may 
now  appear  to  have  planted  the  seminal  idea  of  independence 
in  the  minds  of  the  colonists,  it  was  regarded  neither  by  them 
selves  nor  by  their  English  rulers  as  indicating  pretensions 
unsuitable  to  their  condition.  Even  after  the  Restoration,  the 
commissioners  of  the  federal  union  were  repeatedly  noticed  and 
recognized  in  the  letters  and  official  instruments  of  Charles  the 
Second  ;  and  the  league  itself,  with  some  alterations,  subsisted 
till  very  near  the  era  of  the  British  Revolution.  A  few  years 
after  its  establishment,  the  principal  object  which  engaged  its 
deliberations  and  exertions  was  the  religious  instruction  of  the 
Indians,  —  an  object  which  was  pursued  in  cooperation  with 
the  society  instituted  by  parliament  in  Britain  for  propagating 
the  gospel  in  New  England.2 

While  the  colonists  were  thus  employed  in  devising  meas 
ures  calculated  to  guard,  confirm,  and  mature  their  institutions, 

1  Increase  Mather's  New  England  Troubles.     Neal.     Hutchinson.     Pitkin's 
History. 

2  Hutchinson. 


CHAP.  III.]    NEW  ORDINANCE  FOR  THE  COLONIES.  275 

the  parliament  enacted  an  ordinance  of  which  the  principle 
menaced  those  institutions  with  an  entire  overthrow.  [1643.] 
It  appointed  the  Earl  of  Warwick  governor-in-chief,  and  lord 
high  admiral  of  all  the  British  colonies,  with  a  council  of  five 
peers  and  twelve  commoners  to  assist  him ;  it  empowered  him, 
in  conjunction  with  his  associates,  to  investigate  the  actual 
condition  of  the  colonies  ;  to  require  the  production  of  their 
patents  and  records,  and  the  personal  attendance  and  testimony 
of  any  of  their  inhabitants  ;  to  remove  governors  and  other 
provincial  magistrates  ;  to  replace  them  by  proper  successors  ; 
and  to  delegate  to  these  new  functionaries  as  much  of  the 
power  conferred  on  himself  as  he  should  think  proper.  This 
ordinance,  which  created  an  authority  that  might  have  new- 
modelled  all  the  provincial  governments,  and  abrogated  all  their 
charters,  was  not  suffered  to  remain t  wholly  inoperative.  To 
some  of  the  colonial  commonwealths  the  parliamentary  council 
extended  protection,  and  even  granted  new  patents.1  Happily 
for  Massachusetts,  either  the  peculiar  favor  and  indulgence  of 
which  she  was  deemed  worthy,  or  the  absorbing  interest  of  the 
great  struggle  with  which  England  was  shaken,  prevented  any 
interference  with  her  institutions,  until  a  period  when  her  pro 
vincial  assembly  was  able,  as  we  shall  see,  to  employ  defen 
sive  measures  that  eluded  the  undesirable  interposition  without 
disputing  the  formidable  authority  of  the  parliamentary  council. 
Various  disputes  had  arisen  of  late  years  between  the  in 
habitants  of  New  England  and  the  French  settlers  in  Acadia 
or  Nova  Scotia.  These  differences  were  now  [1644]  adjusted 
by  a  treaty  between  a  commissioner  for  the  king  of  France  on 
the  one  part,  and  John  Endicott,  governor  of  JVeto  England, 
and  the  rest  of  the  magistrates  there,  on  the  other.2  The  colo 
nists  had  already  debarred  themselves  from  recognizing  the  king 
as  a  distinct  authority  from  the  parliament ;  and  they  probably 
found  it  difficult  to  explain  to  the  other  contracting  parties  to 
what  denomination  of  sovereign  power  they  owned  allegiance. 
This  state  of  things,  as  it  engendered  practices,  so  it  may 
have  secretly  fostered  sentiments,  that  savored  of  independ- 

1  Journals  of  the  House  of  Lords.     Chalmers.     The  people  of  Maine  soli 
cited  the  protection  of  the  council  in  1651.  —  Hazard. 

2  Hutchinson. 


276  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

ence.  A  practice  strongly  denoting  pretension  to  sovereign 
authority  was  adopted  a  few  years  after,1  when  the  increasing 
trade  of  the  colonists  with  the  West  Indies,  and  the  quantity 
of  Spanish  bullion  that  was  conveyed  through  this  channel  into 
New  England,  induced  the  provincial  authorities  to  erect  a 
mint  for  the  coinage  of  silver  money  at  Boston.  The  coin 
was  stamped  with  the  name  of  New  England  on  the  one  side  ; 
of  Massachusetts,  as  the  principal  settlement,  on  the  other  ; 
and  with  a  tree,  as  the  symbol  of  national  vigor  and  increase. 
Maryland  was  the  only  other  colony  that  ever  presumed  to 
coin  money  ;  and,  indeed,  this  prerogative  has  been  always 
regarded  as  the  peculiar  attribute  of  sovereignty.  u  But  it 
must  be  considered,"  says  one  of  the  New  England  historians, 
"that  at  this  time  there  was  no  king  in  Israel."  In  the  dis 
tracted  state  of  the  mother  country,  it  might  well  be  judged 
unsafe  to  send  bullion  there  to  be  coined  ;  and  from  the  un 
certainty  respecting  the  form  of  government  which  would  finally 
arise  out  of  the  civil  wars,  it  might  reasonably  be  apprehended 
that  an  impress  received  during  their  continuance  would  not  long 
retain  its  currency.  The  practice  gave  no  umbrage  whatever 
to  the  English  government.  It  received  the  tacit  allowance  of 
the  parliament,  of  Cromwell,  and  even  of  Charles  the  Second, 
during  twenty  years  of  his  reign.2 

The  separation  of  the  two  branches  of  the  legislature  of 
Massachusetts  naturally  gave  rise  to  some  disputes  respecting 
the  boundaries  of  jurisdiction  in  a  constitution  not  yet  matured 
by  practice.  But  what  precedent  could  not  supply,  the  influ 
ence  of  the  provincial  clergy  wras  able  to  accomplish.  [1644.] 
By  common  consent,  all  the  ministers  were  summoned  to  at 
tend  the  session  of  the  assembly,  and  the  points  at  issue  being 
submitted  to  them,  their  decision  was  honored  with  immediate 
and  universal  acquiescence.3  But  in  the  following  year  [1645], 
a  dispute  more  violent  in  its  nature,  and  less  creditable  and 
satisfactory  in  its  result,  was  occasioned  in  this  commonwealth 
by  the  intolerance  which  we  have  already  noted  in  its  original 
institutions.  With  the  growing  prosperity  and  importance  of 
the  provincial  society,  the  value  of  its  political  franchises  was 

1  In  1652.  «  Hutchinson.  3  Ibid. 


CHAP.  III.]  IMPEACHMENT  OF  WINTHROP.  277 

felt  to  be  proportionably  augmented  ;  and  the  increasing  opu 
lence  and  respectability  of  the  dissenters  seemed  to  aggravate 
the  hardship  of  the  disfranchisement  to  which  they  were  sub 
jected.  Some  of  these  persons,  having  proceeded  with  vio 
lence  to  assume  the  privileges  from  which  they  were  excluded 
by  law,  and  disturbed  an  election  by  their  interference,  were 
punished  by  Winthrop,  the  deputy-governor,  who  vigorously 
resisted  and  defeated  their  pretensions.  They  complained  of 
this  treatment  to  the  General  Court  by  a  petition  couched  in 
very  strong  language,  demanding  leave  to  impeach  the  deputy- 
governor  before  the  whole  body  of  his  fellow-citizens,  and  to 
submit  to  the  same  tribunal  the  consideration  of  their  general 
sufferings,  as  well  as  of  the  particular  severities  they  had  ex 
perienced  from  Winthrop.  The  grievances  under  which  they 
labored  were  enumerated  in  the  petition,  which  contained  a 
forcible  remonstrance  against  the  injustice  of  depriving  them 
of  the  rights  of  freemen,  because  they  could  not  conscien 
tiously  unite  with  the  congregational  churches,  or  when  they 
solicited  admission  into  them  were  arbitrarily  rejected  by  the 
ministers.  They  contended  that  either  the  full  rights  of  cit 
izenship  should  be  communicated  to  them,  or  that  they  should 
no  longer  be  required  to  obey  laws  to  which  they  had  not  given 
assent,  to  contribute  to  the  maintenance  of  ministers  from 
whose  labors  they  derived  no  advantage,  or  to  pay  taxes  im 
posed  by  an  assembly  in  which  they  were  not  represented. 
The  court  was  so  far  moved  by  the  petition,  or  by  the  re 
spectability  of  its  promoters,  that  Winthrop  was  commanded 
to  defend  himself  publicly,  before  the  magistrates,  from  the 
charges  which  it  advanced  against  him. 

On  the  day  appointed  for  his  trial,  he  descended  from  his 
official  seat  on  the  bench,  he  being  one  of  the  magistrates,  and, 
placing  himself  at  the  bar  in  presence  of  a  numerous  assemblage 
of  the  inhabitants,  he  addressed  himself  to  explain  and  vindicate 
his  conduct.  Having  clearly  proved  that  the  proceedings  for 
which  he  was  impeached  were  sanctioned  by  law,  and  that  the 
sole  object  of  them  was  to  maintain  the  existing  institutions, 
by  the  exercise  of  the  authority  confided  to  him  for  this  pur 
pose,  he  concluded  an  excellent  harangue  in  the  following 
terms  : — -/'Though  I  be  justified  before  men,  yet  it  may  be, 


278  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

the  Lord  hath  seen  so  much  amiss  in  my  administration  as  calls 
me  to  be  humbled  ;  and,  indeed,  for  me  to  have  been  thus 
charged  by  men  is  a  matter  of  humiliation,  whereof  I  desire  to 
make  a  right  use  before  the  Lord.  If  Miriam's  father  spit  in 
her  face,  she  is  to  be  ashamed."  Then  desiring  leave  to  pro 
pose  some  considerations  by  which  he  hoped  to  rectify  the 
opinions  of  the  people  on  the  nature  of  government :  "  The 
questions,"  he  observed,  "that  have  troubled  the  country  have 
been  about  the  authority  of  the  magistracy  and  the  liberty  of 
the  people.  It  is  you  who  have  called  us  unto  this  office  ;  but 
being  thus  called,  we  have  our  authority  from  God.  Magistracy 
is  the  ordinance  of  God,  and  it  hath  the  image  of  God  stamped 
upon  it ;  and  the  contempt  of  it  has  been  vindicated  by  God 
with  terrible  examples  of  his  vengeance.  I  entreat  you  to 
consider,  that,  when  you  choose  magistrates,  you  take  them 
from  among  yourselves,  men  subject  unto  like  passions  with 
yourselves.  If  you  see  our  infirmities,  reflect  on  your  own, 
and  you  will  not  be  so  severe  censurers  of  ours.  The  cove 
nant  between  us  and  you  is  the  oath  you  have  exacted  of  us, 
which  is  to  this  purpose,  that  we  shall  govern  you  and  judge 
your  causes  according  to  God's  laws  and  the  particular  statutes 
of  the  land,  according  to  our  best  skill.  As  for  our  skill,  you 
must  run  the  hazard  of  it ;  and  if  there  be  an  error  only  there 
in,  and  not  in  the  will,  it  becomes  you  to  bear  it.  Nor  would 
I  have  you  to  mistake  in  the  point  of  your  own  liberty.  There 
is  a  liberty  of  corrupt  nature,  which  is  affected  both  by  men 
and  beasts,  to  do  what  they  list.  This  liberty  is  inconsistent 
with  authority  ;  impatient  of  all  restraint  (by  this  liberty  sumus 
omnes  deteriores) ,  't  is  the  grand  enemy  of  truth  and  peace, 
and  all  the  ordinances  of  God  are  bent  against  it.  But  there 
is  civil,  a  moral,  a  federal  liberty,  which  is  the  proper  end  and 
object  of  authority ;  it  is  a  liberty  for  that  only  which  is  just 
and  good.  For  this  liberty  you  are  to  stand  with  the  hazard 
of  your  very  lives  ;  and  whatsoever  crosses  it  is  not  authority, 
but  a  distemper  thereof.  This  liberty  is  maintained  in  a  way  of 
subjection  to  authority  ;  and  the  authority  set  over  you  will,  in 
all  administrations  for  your  good,  be  quietly  submitted  unto  by 
all  but  such  as  have  a  disposition  to  shake  off  the  yoke,  and 


CHAP.  III.]  PRESBYTERIAN  MALCONTENTS.  279 

lose  their  true  liberty  by  their  murmuring   at   the  honor  and 
power  of  authority." 

The  circumstances  in  which  this  address  was  delivered 
recall  the  most  interesting  scenes  of  Greek  and  Roman  story, 
while,  in  the  wisdom,  piety,  and  dignity  that  it  breathes,  it 
resembles  the  magnanimous  vindication  of  a  judge  of  Israel. 
Winthrop  was  not  only  acquitted  by  the  judicial  sentence  of 
the  court  and  the  approving  voice  of  the  public,  but  recom 
mended  so  strongly  to  the  esteem  of  his  fellow-citizens  by  this 
and  all  the  other  indications  of  his  character,  that  he  was 
chosen  governor  of  Massachusetts  every  year  after  as  long  as 
he  lived.1  [1646.]  His  accusers  incurred  a  proportional  de 
gree  of  public  displeasure  ;  their  petition  was  rejected,  and 
several  of  the  chief  promoters  of  it  were  severely  reprimanded, 
and  adjudged  to  make  open  acknowledgment  of  their  fault  in 
seeking  to  subvert  the  fundamental  laws  of  the  colony.  Refusing 
to  acknowledge  that  they  had  acted  amiss,  and  still  persisting 
in  their  clamor  for  an  alteration  of  the  law,  with  very  indiscreet 
threats  of  complaining  to  the  parliament,  they  were  punished 
with  fine  or  imprisonment.  Most  of  them  were  known  or 
believed  to  incline  to  the  ecclesiastical  form  of  Presbytery  ; 
and  as  this  peculiar  constitution  was  also  affected  by  the  pre 
vailing  party  in  the  English  House  of  Commons,  the  menace 
of  a  complaint  to  parliament  excited  general  anger  and  alarm. 
A  deputation  of  the  malcontents  having  made  preparation  to 
sail  for  England,  and  given  significant  hints  of  the  changes  they 
hoped  to  procure  by  their  machinations  in  the  parent  state, 
some  of  them  were  placed  under  arrest,  and  their  papers  were 
seized  and  examined.  Among  these  papers  were  found  peti 
tions  to  Lord  Warwick,  urging  a  forfeiture  of  the  provincial 

1  This  excellent  magistrate  (says  Cotton  Mather)  continually  exemplified 
the  maxim  of  Theodosius,  that,  If  any  man  speak  evil  of  the  ruler,  if  it  be 
through  lightness,  't  is  to  be  contemned ;  if  it  be  through  madness,  't  is  to  be 
pitied;  if  "through  malice,  't  is  to  be  forgiven.  One  of  the  colonists,  who  had 
long  manifested  much  ill-will  towards  His  person,  at  length  wrote  to  him,  "  Sir, 
your  overcoming  of  yourself  hath  overcome  me."  At  his  third  election  to  the 
office  of  governor,  he  declared,  in  a  speech  to  his  fellow-citizens,  that  he  had 
hitherto  accepted  with  a  trembling  hand  the  presents  by  which  they  had  ac 
knowledged  his  services,  and  could  no  longer  consent  to  a  repetition  of  them. 
In  the  close  of  his  life,  he  is  said  to  have  expressed  regret  for  the  sanction  he 
had  given  to  intolerance.  His  death,  in  1649,  was  deeply  and  universally 
bewailed ;  and  all  declared  that  he  had  been  the  father  of  the  colony,  and  the 
first  alike  in  virtue  and  in  place. 


280  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

charter,  the  introduction  of  a  Presbyterian  establishment,  and 
of  the  whole  code  of  English  jurisprudence,  into  the  provincial 
institutions,  together  with  various  other  innovations,  which 
were  represented  as  at  once  accordant  with  legislatorial  wis 
dom  and  justice,  and  conducive  to  the  important  object  of  se 
curing  and  enlarging  the  sovereign  authority  of  the  parliament 
over  the  colony.  The  discovery  of  the  intolerance  contem 
plated  by  these  persons  served  to  exasperate  the  intolerance 
which  they  themselves  were  experiencing  from  the  society  of 
which  they  formed  but  an  insignificant  fraction.  The  contents 
of  their  papers  excited  so  much  resentment,  that  not  a  voice 
was  raised  against  the  iniquity  of  the  process  by  which  the 
documents  had  been  intercepted  ;  and  the  alarm  was  increased 
by  the  manifest  impossibility  of  preventing  designs  so  danger 
ous  from  being  still  pursued.  The  ardor  of  the  public  senti 
ment,  as  well  as  the  peculiar  nature  of  the  subject  that  excited 
it,  introduced  this  all-prevalent  topic  into  the  pulpit ;  and  even 
John  Cotton  was  so  far  heated  and  transported  by  the  conta 
gion  of  passionate  zeal,  as  to  declare,  in  a  sermon,  "  that,  if 
any  one  should  carry  writings  or  complaints  against  the  people 
of  God  in  this  country  to  England,  he  would,  doubtless,  find 
himself  in  the  predicament  of  Jonah  in  the  vessel."  This 
was  a  prediction  to  which  a  long  voyage  was  not  unlikely  to 
give  at  least  a  seeming  fulfilment.  In  effect,  a  short  time 
after,  certain  deputies  from  the  petitioners,  having  embarked  for 
England,  were  overtaken  by  a  violent  storm  ;  whereupon,  the 
sailors,  recollecting  the  prediction  that  had  gone  abroad,  and, 
happily,  considering  the  papers,  and  not  the  bearers  of  them, 
as  the  offending  part  of  the  shipment,  insisted  so  vehemently 
on  casting  all  obnoxious  writings  overboard,  that  the  deputies 
were  obliged  to  commit  their  credentials  to  the  waves.  Yet, 
when  they  arrived  in  England,  they  did  not  fail  to  prosecute 
their  mission  ;  but  the  attention  of  the  parliamentary  leaders 
at  that  time  being  deeply  engaged  with  more  important  matters, 
and  Winslow  and  Hugh  Peters,  on  behalf  of  the  colony,  ac 
tively  laboring  to  traverse  the  designs  of  the  applicants,  they 
obtained  little  attention  and  no  redress.1 

1  Mather.    Neal.    Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


JHAP.  III.]  JOHN  ELIOT.  281 

From  the  painful  survey  of  intolerance  and  contentious  zeal 
for  the  forms  of  religion,  it  is  pleasing  to  turn  to  the  substantial 
fruits  of  Christian  sentiment  displayed  in  those  memorable  ex 
ertions  for  the  conversion  of  the  Indians,  that  originated  in 
the  same  year  that  witnessed  so  much  dispute  and  animosity. 
[1646.]  The  circumstances  that  promoted  the  emigrations 
to  New  England  had  operated  with  especial  force  on  the 
ministers  of  the  Puritans  ;  and  so  many  of  these  spiritual 
directors  had  accompanied  the  other  settlers,  that,  among  a 
people  who  derived  less  enjoyment  from  the  exercises  of  piety, 
the  numbers  of  the  clergy  would  have  been  reckoned  exceed 
ingly  burdensome,  and  very  much  disproportioned  to  the  wants 
of  the  laity.  This  circumstance  was  highly  favorable  to  the 
promotion  of  religious  habits  among  the  colonists,  as  well  as 
to  the  extension  of  their  settlements,  in  the  plantation  of  which 
the  cooperation  of  a  minister  was  accounted  indispensable. 
It  contributed  also  to  suggest  and  facilitate  missionary  labor 
among  the  neighbouring  heathens,  to  whom  the  colonists  had 
associated  themselves  by  superadding  the  ties  of  a  common 
country  to  those  of  a  common  nature.  While  the  people  at 
large  were  progressively  extending  their  industry,  and  subduing 
by  culture  the  rudeness  of  desert  nature,  the  ministers  of  re 
ligion  with  earnest  zeal  aspired  to  an  extension  of  their  peculiar 
sphere  of  usefulness  ;  and  at  a  very  early  period  entertained 
designs  of  redeeming  to  the  dominion  of  piety  and  civility 
the  neglected  wastes  of  human  life  and  character  that  lay 
stretched  in  savage  ignorance  and  idolatry  around  them.  John 
Eliot,  one  of  the  ministers  of  Roxbury,  a  man  whose  large 
soul  glowed  with  the  intensest  flame  of  holy  charity,  was 
deeply  penetrated  with  a  sense  of  this  duty,  and  for  some  time 
had  been  laboriously  qualifying  himself  to  overcome  the  pre 
liminary  difficulty  by  which  its  performance  was  obstructed. 
He  had  now  by  diligent  study  attained  such  acquaintance  with 
the  Indian  language  as  enabled  him  not  only  to  speak  it  with 
fluency,  but  to  facilitate  the  acquisition  of  it  to  others,  by  the 
construction  and  publication  of  a  system  of  Indian  Grammar. 
Having  completed  his  preparatory  inquiries,  he  began,  in  the 
close  of  this  year  [October,  1646],  a  scene  of  pious  labor 
which  has  been  traced  with  great  interest  and  accuracy  by  the 

VOL.   i.  36 


282  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

ecclesiastical  historians  of  New  England,  and  still  more  minute 
ly,  we  may  believe,  in  that  eternal  record  where  alone  the  ac 
tions  of  men  obtain  their  just,  their  final,  and  everlasting  pro 
portions.     It  is  a  remarkable  feature  in  his  long  and  arduous 
career,  that  the  spirit  and  energy  by  which  he  was  supported 
never  incurred  the  slightest  abatement,  but,  on  the  contrary, 
manifested  a  steady  and  continual  increase.     He  confidently 
relied  on  its  unfailing  endurance  ;   and  always  referring  it  to 
divine  infusion,  felt  assured  of  its  derivation  from  a  fountain  in 
capable  of  being  wasted  by  the  most  liberal  communication. 
Every  thing  he  saw  or  knew  occurred  to  him  in  a  religious 
aspect  ;  every  faculty,  and  every  acquisition  that  he  derived 
from  the  employment  of  his  faculties,  was  received  by  him  as  a 
ray  imparted  to  his  soul  from  that  supreme  source  of  sentiment 
and  intelligence  which  was  the  object  of  his  earnest  contem 
plation  and  continual  desire.     As  he  was  one  of  the  holiest, 
so  was  he  also  one  of  the  happiest  and  most  beloved  of  men. 
When  he  felt  himself  disabled  from  preaching  by  the  infirmi 
ties  of  old  age,  he  proposed  to  his  parishioners  of  Roxbury 
to  resign  his  ministerial  salary  ;  but  these  good  people  unani 
mously  declared  that  they  would  willingly  pay  the  stipend,  for 
the  advantage  and  honor  of  having  him  reside  among  them. 
His  example,  indeed,  was  the  most  valuable  part  of  his  minis 
try  among  Christians  ;   his  life,  during  many  years,  being  a 
continual  and  manifest  effusion  of  soul  in  devotion  to  God  and 
charity  to  mankind. 

The  mild,  persuasive  address  of  Eliot  soon  gained  him  a 
favorable  audience  from  many  of  the  Indians  ; l  and  having 
successfully  represented  to  them  the  expediency  of  an  entire 
departure  from  their  savage  habits  of  life,  he  obtained  from  the 
General  Court  a  suitable  tract  of  land  adjoining  to  the  settle 
ment  of  Concord,  in  Massachusetts,  where  a  number  of  Indian 
families  began,  under  his  counsel,  to  erect  fixed  habitations  for 
themselves,  and  where  they  eagerly  received  his  instructions, 
both  spiritual  and  secular.  It  was  not  long  before  a  violent 
opposition  to  these  innovations  was  excited  by  the  powwows,  or 
Indian  priests,  who  threatened  death,  and  other  inflictions  of  the 

1  See  Note  VII.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 


CHAP.  III.]   MISSIONARY  LABORS  AMONG  THE  INDIANS.  283 

vengeance  of  their  idols,  on  all  who  should  embrace  Christiani 
ty.  The  menaces  and  artifices  of  these  persons  caused  sev 
eral  of  the  seeming  proselytes  to  draw  back,  but  induced  others 
to  separate  themselves  entirely  from  the  society  and  converse 
of  the  main  body  of  their  countrymen,  and  court  the  advan 
tage  of  a  closer  association  with  that  superior  race  of  men  who 
showed  themselves  so  generously  willing  to  diffuse  and  commu 
nicate  the  capacity  and  benefits  of  their  own  improved  con 
dition.  A  considerable  number  of  Indians  resorted  to  the 
land  allotted  to  them  by  the  provincial  government,  and  ex 
changed  their  wild  and  barbarous  habits  for  the  modes  of  civil 
ized  life  and  industry.  Eliot  was  continually  among  them, 
instructing,  animating,  and  directing  them.  They  felt  his  su 
perior  wisdom,  and  saw  him  continually  and  serenely  happy  ; 
and  there  was  nothing  in  his  exterior  condition  that  indicated 
sources  of  enjoyment  from  which  they  were  necessarily  de 
barred.  On  the  contrary,  it  was  obvious,  that  of  every  article 
of  merely  selfish  comfort  he  was  willing  to  divest  himself,  in 
order  to  communicate  to  them  a  share  of  what  he  esteemed  the 
only  true  riches  of  an  immortal  being.  The  women  in  the  new 
settlement  learned  to  spin  ;  the  men  to  dig  and  till  the  ground  ; 
and  the  children  were  instructed  in  the  English  language,  and 
taught  to  read  and  write,  or,  as  the  Indians  expressed  them 
selves,  to  get  news  from  paper,  and  mark  their  thoughts  on  it. 
As  the  numbers  of  domesticated  Indians  increased,  they 
built  a  town  by  the  side  of  Charles  River,  which  they  called 
Natick  ;  and  they  desired  Eliot  to  frame  a  system  of  muni 
cipal  government  for  them.  He  directed  their  attention  to 
the  counsel  that  Jethro  gave  to  Moses  ;  and,  in  conformity 
with  it,  they  elected  for  themselves  rulers  of  hundreds,  of  fif 
ties,  and  of  tens.  The  provincial  government  also  established 
a  tribunal,  which,  without  assuming  jurisdiction  over  them,  ten 
dered  the  assistance  of  its  judicial  mediation  to  all  who  might 
be  willing  to  refer  to  it  the  adjustment  of  their  more  difficult 
or  important  controversies.  In  endeavouring  to  extend  their 
missionary  influence  among  the  surrounding  tribes,  Eliot  and 
the  associates  of  his  labors  (men  like-minded  with  himself)  en 
countered  a  variety  of  success,  corresponding  to  the  visible  va 
rieties  of  human  character,  and  the  invisible  predeterminations 


284  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

of  the  divine  will.  Many  persons  expressed  the  utmost  ab 
horrence  and  contempt  of  Christianity  ;  some  made  a  hollow 
profession  of  willingness  to  learn,  and  even  of  conviction,  — 
with  the  view,  as  it  afterwards  proved,  of  obtaining  the  tools 
and  other  articles  of  value  that  were  furnished  to  every  Indian 
who  proposed  to  embrace  the  habits  of  civilized  life.  In  spite 
of  great  discouragement,  the  missionaries  persisted  ;  and  the 
difficulties  that  at  first  mocked  their  efforts  seeming  at  length 
to  vanish  under  an  influence  at  once  mysterious  and  irresistible, 
their  labors  were  crowned  with  astonishing  success.  The 
character  and  habits  of  the  lay  colonists  promoted  the  efficacy 
of  these  pious  exertions,  in  a  manner  which  will  be  forcibly 
appreciated  by  ah1  who  have  examined  the  history  and  pro 
gress  of  missions.  Simple  in  their  manners,  devout,  moral, 
and  industrious  in  their  conduct  and  demeanour,  they  enforced 
the  lessons  of  the  missionaries  by  demonstrating  their  practi 
cability  and  beneficial  effects,  and  exhibited  a  model  of  life, 
which,  in  point  of  refinement,  was  not  too  elevated  for  Indian 
imitation. 

While  Eliot  and  an  increasing  company  of  associates  were 
thus  employed  in  the  province  of  Massachusetts,  Thomas  May- 
hew,  a  man  who  combined  the  gentlest  manners  with  the  most 
ardent  and  enthusiastic  spirit,  together  with  a  few  coadjutors, 
diligently  prosecuted  the  same  design  in  Martha's  Vineyard, 
Nantucket,  and  the  Elizabeth  Islands,  and  the  territory  compre 
hended  in  the  Plymouth  patent.  Abasing  themselves  that  they 
might  elevate  their  species  and  promote  the  divine  glory,  and 
counting  their  work  their  wages,  they  labored  with  their  own 
hands  among  those  Indians  whom  they  persuaded  to  forsake 
savage  habits  ;  and  zealously  employing  all  the  influence  they 
acquired  to  the  communication  of  moral  and  spiritual  improve 
ment,  they  beheld  their  exertions  rewarded  by  the  happiest  re 
sults.  The  character  and  manners  of  Mayhew  were  singularly 
calculated  to  excite  the  tenderness,  no  less  than  the  venera 
tion,  of  the  objects  of  his  benevolence.  His  address  derived  a 
penetrating  interest  from  that  earnest  concern  and  high  and 
holy  value  which  he  manifestly  entertained  for  every  member 
of  the  family  of  mankind.  Many  years  after  his  death,  the  In 
dians  could  not  hear  his  name  mentioned  without  shedding 


CHAP.  III.]   MISSIONARY  LABORS  AMONG  THE  INDIANS.  285 

tears  and  betraying  transports  of  grateful  emotion.  Both  El 
iot  and  Mayhew  found  great  advantage  in  the  practice  of  se 
lecting  the  most  docile  and  ingenious  of  their  Indian  pupils, 
and  by  especial  attention  to  their  instruction,  qualifying  them  to 
act  as  schoolmasters  among  their  countrymen.  To  a  zeal  that 
seemed  to  increase  by  exercise  they  added  insurmountable 
patience  and  admirable  prudence  ;  and  steadily  fixing  their 
view  on  the  glory  of  the  Most  High,  and  declaring,  that, 
whether  outwardly  successful  or  not  in  promoting  it,  they  felt 
themselves  blessed  and  happy  in  pursuing  it,  —  they  found  its 
influence  sufficient  to  light  them  through  the  darkness  of  every 
perplexity  and  peril,  and  finally  conduct  them  to  a  degree  of 
success  and  victory  unparalleled,  perhaps,  since  that  era  when 
the  miraculous  endowments  of  the  apostolic  ministry  caused 
multitudes  to  be  converted  in  a  day.  They  were  not  hasty 
in  urging  the  Indians  to  embrace  improved  institutions  ;  they 
desired  rather  to  lead  them  insensibly  forward,  —  more  es 
pecially  in  the  establishment  of  religious  ordinances.  Those 
practices,  indeed,  which  they  accounted  likely  to  commend 
themselves  by  their  obviously  beneficial  effects  to  the  natural 
understanding  of  men,  they  were  not  restrained  from  recom 
mending  to  their  early  adoption  ;  and  trial  by  jury  very  soon 
superseded  the  savage  modes  of  determining  right  or  ascertain 
ing  guilt,  and  contributed  to  improve  and  refine  the  sense  of 
equity.  In  the  dress  and  mode  of  cohabitation  of  the  savages 
they  also  introduced,  at  an  early  period,  alterations  calculated 
to  form  and  develope  a  sentiment  of  modesty,  of  which  the  In 
dians  were  found  to  be  grossly  and  universally  deficient.  But 
all  those  practices  which  are,  or  ought  to  be,  exclusively  the 
fruits  of  renewed  nature  and  divine  light,  they  desired  to  teach 
entirely  by  example,  and  by  diligently  radicating  and  cultivating 
in  the  minds  of  their  flocks  the  principles  out  of  which  alone 
such  visible  fruits  of  piety  can  lastingly  and  beneficially  grow. 
It  was  not  till  the  year  1660,  that  the  first  Indian  church  was 
founded  by  Eliot  and  his  fellow-laborers  in  Massachusetts. 
There  were  at  that  time  no  fewer  than  ten  settlements  within 
the  province,  occupied  by  Indians  comparatively  civilized. 

Eliot  had  occasionally  translated  and   printed  various  ap 
proved  theological  dissertations  for  the  use  of  the  Indians  ; 


286  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

and  at  length,  in  the  year  1664,  the  Bible  was  printed,  for  the 
first  time,  in  one  of  the  native  languages  of  the  New  World,  at 
Cambridge,  in  Massachusetts.1  This,  indeed,  was  not  accom 
plished  without  the  assistance  of  pecuniary  contributions  from 
the  mother  country.  The  colonists  had  zealously  and  cheerfully 
cooperated  with  their  ministers,  and  assisted  to  defray  the  cost 
of  their  charitable  enterprises  ;  but  the  increasing  expenses 
threatened  at  last  to  exceed  what  their  narrow  means  were 
competent  to  afford.  Happily,  the  tidings  of  this  great  work 
excited  a  kindred  spirit  in  the  parent  state,  where,  in  the  year 
1649,  there  was  formed,  by  act  of  parliament,  a  Society  for 
propagating  the  Gospel  in  New  England,  whose  cooperation 
proved  of  essential  service  to  the  missionary  cause.  This  so 
ciety,  dissolved  at  the  Restoration,  was  afterwards  reestab 
lished  by  a  charter  from  Charles  the  Second,  obtained  by  the 
exertions  of  the  pious  Richard  Baxter  and  the  influence  of  the 
illustrious  Robert  Boyle,  who  thus  approved  himself  the  bene 
factor  of  New  England  as  well  as  of  Virginia.  Supported  by 
its  ample  endowments,  and  the  liberal  contributions  of  their 
own  fellow-colonists,  the  American  missionaries  exerted  them 
selves  with  such  energy  and  success  in  the  work  of  converting 
and  civilizing  the  savages,  that,  before  the  close  of  the  seven 
teenth  century,  there  were  collected  in  the  province  of  Massa 
chusetts  more  than  thirty  congregations  of  Indians,  comprising 
upwards  of  three  thousand  persons,  reclaimed  from  a  gross  bar 
barism  and  degrading  superstition,  and  advanced  to  the  comfort 
and  respectability  of  civilized  life,  and  the  dignity  and  happi 
ness  of  worshippers  of  the  true  God.  There  were  nearly  as 
many  converts  to  religion  and  civility  in  the  islands  of  Massa 
chusetts  Bay  ;  there  were  several  Indian  congregations  in  the 
Plymouth  territories  ;  and  among  some  of  the  tribes  that  still 
pursued  their  wonted  style  of  roving  life  there  was  introduced 
a  considerable  improvement  in  civil  and  moral  habits.  Several 
Indians  received  education  at  Harvard  College  ;  from  which, 

1  I  have  seen  a  copy  of  this  edition  of  the  Bible  in  the  library  of  the  late 
George  Chalmers.  It  is  a  beautiful  piece  of  typography. 

Many  earlier  publications  had  already  issued  from  the  fertile  press  of  New 
England.  One  of  the  first  was  a  new  metrical  translation  of  the  Psalms,  — 
very  literal  and  very  inelegant.  To  this  last  imputation  the  New  Englanders 
answered,  "that  God's  altars  need  not  our  pohshings." — Oldmixon. 


CHAP.  III.]    RESULTS  OF  THE  INDIAN  MISSIONS.  287 

in  the  year  1665,  one  of  their  number  obtained  the  degree  of 
Bachelor  of  Arts. 

Among  the  various  difficulties  that  obstructed  the  improve 
ments  which  the  missionaries  attempted  to  introduce  into  the 
temporal  condition  of  the  Indians,  it  was  found  that  the  hu 
man  constitution  had  been  greatly  deteriorated  by  ages  of 
savage  life.  Unacquainted  with  moderation,  and  accustomed 
to  vibrate  between  intense  toil  and  sluggish  supineness,  the  In 
dians  at  once  relished  indolence  and  loathed  the  even  tenor  of 
tranquil  exertion.  Habits  of  alternate  sloth  and  activity,  in 
dulged  from  generation  to  generation,  seemed  to  have  gradually 
imparted  a  character  or  bias  to  their  animal  faculties,  scarcely 
less  fixed  and  inveterate  than  the  depraved  hue  of  the  negro 
body,  and  to  have  deeply  impaired  the  capacity  of  continuous 
application.  In  every  employment  that  demanded  steady  la 
bor,  the  Indians  were  found  unequal  to  the  Europeans.  The 
first  missionaries  and  their  immediate  successors  sustained  this 
discouragement  without  shrinking,  and  animated  their  converts 
to  resist  or  endure  it.  But  at  a  later  period,  when  it  appeared 
that  the  taint  which  the  Indian  constitution  had  received  con 
tinued  to  be  propagated  among  descendants  educated  in  habits 
widely  different  from  those  of  their  forefathers,  many  persons 
began  too  hastily  to  apprehend  that  the  imperfection  was  in 
curable  ;  and  missionary  ardor  was  abated  by  the  very  cir 
cumstance  that  most  strongly  solicited  its  revival  and  enlarge 
ment.  In  concurrence  with  this  cause  of  decline,  the  ardent 
gratitude  awakened  in  the  first  converts  was  chilled  in  its  trans 
mission  to  succeeding  generations  ;  and  the  consequence  un 
happily  was,  that  a  considerable  abatement  ensued  of  the  piety, 
morality,  and  industry  of  the  Indian  communities  that  had 
been  reclaimed  from  savage  life.  The  members  of  these  com 
munities  were  depressed  by  many  mortifying  circumstances  in 
cident  to  their  condition,  being  exposed  to  the  aversion  and 
contempt  of  the  mass  of  their  race,  from  which  they  were  so 
cially  cut  off,  though  still  visibly  allied  to  it  by  their  color  ; 
while  from  the  same  color  and  other  qualities,  even  when  kind 
ly  treated,  they  were  regarded  with  little  respect  by  the  gen 
erality  of  the  white  colonists,  who  considered  them  rather  as 
children  and  inferiors  than  as  men  and  equals.  Yet  the  mission- 


288  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

ary  work  was  never  entirely  abandoned,  nor  its  visible  fruits  suf 
fered  wholly  to  disappear.  Amidst  occasional  decline  and 
revival,  the  New  England  missions  have  been  always  pursued  ; 
and  converts  to  piety  and  civility  have  continued  to  attest  their 
beneficial  efficacy  upon  the  Indian  race.1 

Having  already  transgressed  considerably  the  march  of  time, 
in  order  to  exhibit  a  brief  but  unbroken  view  of  the  foregoing 
scene  of  missionary  labor,  we  now  return  to  follow  more  leis 
urely  the  general  stream  of  affairs  in  New  England. 

Shortly  after  the  dissensions  which  we  have  remarked  in  the 
year  1646,  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  recommend 
ed  the  convocation  of  a  synod  of  the  churches  of  New  Eng 
land,  in  order  to  frame  a  uniform  scheme  of  church  disci 
pline  for  all  the  provincial  congregations.  The  proposal  was 
resisted  by  several  of  the  churches,  which  expressed  appre 
hension  of  the  arbitrary  purposes  and  superstitious  devices 
which  might  be  promoted  by  the  dangerous  practice  of  con- 
vocating  synods.  But  at  length,  the  persuasion  generally  pre 
vailing  that  an  assembly  of  this  description  possessed  no  posi 
tive  authority,  and  that  its  functions  were  confined  to  the  ten 
dering  of  counsel,  the  second  synod  of  New  England  was  con 
voked  at  Cambridge.  [1648.]  The  confession  of  faith  that 
had  recently  been  published  by  the  Assembly  of  Divines  at 
Westminster  was  thoroughly  examined  and  unanimously  ap 
proved.  Three  of  the  most  eminent  of  the  provincial  minis 
ters,  Cotton,  Partridge,  and  Mather,  were  then  appointed  to 
prepare  a  model  of  discipline  for  the  New  England  churches. 
The  Platform  of  Church  Discipline ,  which  they  composed 
accordingly,  and  presented  to  the  synod,  after  many  long  de 
bates,  received  general  approbation  and  almost  universal  ac 
quiescence.2 

A  dispute  had  for  some  time  prevailed  between  Massachu- 

1  Day-breaking  of  the  Gospel  in  New  England.  Shepherd's  Clear  Sunshine 
of  the  Gospel  upon  the  Indians.  Eliot's  and  Mayhew's  Letters.  Mayhew's 
Indian  Converts.  Whitfield's  Discovery  of  the  present  State  of  the  Indians. 
Of  these,  and  of  various  other  works  on  the  same  subject,  copies  exist,  partly 
in  the  Redcross-street  Library  of  London,  and  partly  in  the  Advocate  s  Li 
brary  of  Edinburgh.  Baxter's  Life.  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Peirce's 
History  of  Harvard  University.  The  Indian  tribes  within  the  Connecticut 
territory  proved  remarkably  indocile.  Some  individuals  were  converted  ;  but 
no  Indian  church  was  ever  gathered  in  this  State.  Trumbull. 

1  Neal. 


CHAP.  III.]      DISCORDS  IN  THE  CONFEDERACY.  289 

setts  and  Connecticut  respecting  a  commercial  tax  imposed  by 
the  legislature  of  Connecticut,  and  which  operated  with  very 
questionable  equity  and  most  unquestionable  disadvantage  on 
the  inhabitants  of  Massachusetts.  [1649.]  Having  complained 
to  the  commissioners  of  the  confederated  provinces,  and  not 
obtaining  redress  as  speedily  as  they  deemed  themselves  en 
titled  to  expect,  the  legislative  authorities  of  Massachusetts 
issued  an  ordinance  imposing  a  retaliatory  duty  not  only  on 
goods  imported  from  Connecticut,  but  on  importations  from  all 
the  other  States  of  the  confederation.  This  unjust  proceeding 
could  be  defended  only  by  superior  strength  ;  an  advantage 
which  so  manifestly  resided  with  Massachusetts,  that  the  other 
confederates  had  nothing  to  oppose  to  it  but  an  appeal  to  those 
principles  of  equity  which  one  of  their  own  number  had  al 
ready  set  the  example  of  disregarding.  Happily  for  them,  and 
for  herself,  their  ally,  though  liable  to  be  betrayed  into  error 
by  resentment  and  partiality,  was  not  intoxicated  with  con 
scious  power.  They  presented  a  remonstrance  to  the  General 
Court  of  Massachusetts,  desiring  it  "  seriously  to  consider 
whether  such  proceedings  agree  with  the  law  of  love,  and  the 
tenor  of  the  articles  of  confederation."  On  receiving  this  re 
monstrance,  the  government  of  Massachusetts,  superior  to  the 
mean  shame  of  acknowledging  a  fault,  consented  to  suspend 
the  obnoxious  ordinance.1  [1650.] 

1  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Another  dispute,  which  occurred  about  three 
years  after,  between  Massachusetts  and  the  other  confederated  States,  is  re 
lated  with  great  minuteness,  and  I  think  with  no  small  injustice  and  partiality, 
by  the  respectable  historian  of  Connecticut.  In  1653,  a  discovery  was  sup 
posed  to  have  been  made  of  a  conspiracy  between  Stuyvesant,  the  governor 
of  the  Dutch  colony  afterwards  called  New  York,  and  the  Indians,  for  the 
extermination  of  the  English.  The  evidence  of  this  sanguinary  project 
(which  Stuyvesant  indignantly  disclaimed)  was  judged  sufficient,  and  the 
resolution  of  a  general  war  embraced  by  all  the  commissioners  of  the  union 
except  those  of  Massachusetts.  The  General  Court  of  this  province  reckoned 
the  proof  inconclusive,  and  were  fortified  in  this  opinion  by  the  judgment  of 
their  clergy,  which  they  consented  to  abide  by.  To  all  the  remonstrances  of 
their  allies  they  answered,  that  no  articles  of  confederation  should  induce 
them  to  undertake  an  offensive  war  which  they  considered  unjust,  and  in 
which  they  could  not  expect  the  advantage  of  divine  favor.  The  historian 
of  Connecticut,  not  content  with  reprobating  this  infringement  of  the  articles 
of  union,  indignantly  censures  the  scruples  of  Massachusetts  as  insincere. 
Trumbull.  But,  in  truth,  the  evidence  or  the  Dutch  plot  labored  under  very 
serious  defects,  which  were  much  more  coolly  weighed  by  the  people  of  Mas 
sachusetts  than  by  the  inhabitants  of  Connecticut  and  New  Haven,  exas 
perated  by  frequent  disputes  with  the  Dutch,  and  exposed  by  their  local  situa 
tion  to  the  greatest  danger  from  Dutch  hostilities.  In  the  beginning  of  the 

VOL.   i.  37 


290  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

But  Massachusetts,  in  the  following  year  [1651],  was  en 
gaged  in  controversy  with  a  power  more  formidable  to  her 
than  she  was  to  her  confederates,  and  much  less  accessible  to 
sentiments  of  moderation  and  forbearance.  The  Long  Par 
liament,  having  now  established  its  authority  in  England,  was 
determined  to  exact  an  explicit  recognition  of  it  from  all  the 
foreign  dependencies  of  the  state,  and  even  to  introduce  such 
recognition  into  the  charters  and  official  style  and  procedure 
of  subordinate  communities.  A  mandate  was  accordingly  trans 
mitted  to  the  governor  and  assembly  of  Massachusetts,  requir 
ing  them  to  send  their  charter  to  London  ;  to  accept  a  new 
patent  from  the  keepers  of  the  liberties  of  England  ;  and  to 
express  in  all  public  writs  and  judicial  proceedings  the  depend 
ence  of  the  provincial  authorities  on  those  existing  depositaries 
of  supreme  power  in  the  parent  state.  This  command  excited 
the  utmost  alarm  in  the  colony  ;  nor  could  all  the  attachment 
of  the  people  to  the  cause  of  the  parliament1  reconcile  them 
to  a  surrender  of  the  title  under  which  their  settlements  and 
institutions  had  been  formed,  and  which  had  never  obstructed 
their  obedience  to  the  authorities  that  now  proposed  to  revoke 
it.  The  parliament,  indeed,  had  no  more  right  to  supersede 
the  original  patent  of  the  colony,  than  to  require  the  city  of 
London,  or  any  of  the  other  corporations  of  England,  to  sub 
mit  their  charters  to  similar  dissolution  and  renovation.  But 
the  colonists  were  aware  that  the  authorities  which  issued  this 
arbitrary  mandate  had  the  power  to  give  it  practical  effect ; 
and,  accordingly,  declining  a  direct  collision  with  superior 
force,  they  reverted  to  the  same  policy  which  they  had  once 
before  successfully  employed  to  counteract  the  tyrannical  de 
signs  of  the  late  king  ;  and  now  succeeded  in  completely  foiling 

following  century,  the  situation  of  the  provinces  was  so  far  reversed,  that 
Massachusetts  was  compelled  to  solicit  me  aid  of  Connecticut  in  a  war  with 
the  Indians;  and,  on  this  occasion,  Connecticut,  remote  from  the  scene  of  ac 
tion,  at  first  refused  her  aid,  upon  scruples  (which  she  afterwards  ascertained 
to  be  groundless)  respecting  the  justice  of  the  cause  to  which  her  support  was 
desired.  —  Trumbull. 

1  Though  attached  to  the  cause  of  the  parliament,  the  people  of  New  Eng 
land  had  so  far  forgotten  their  own  wrongs,  and  escaped  the  contagion  of  the 
passions  engendered  in  the  civil  war,  that  the  tragical  fate  of  the  king  appears 
to  have  excited  general  grief  and  concern.  The  public  expression  of  such 
sentiments  would  have  been  equally  inexpedient  and  unavailing ;  but  that 
they  were  entertained  is  certain.  —  See  Hutchinson. 


CHAP.  III.]  SURRENDER  OF  CHARTER  AGAIN  DEMANDED.  291 

the  leaders  of  that  parliamentary  assembly,  so  renowned  for 
its  success,  resolution,  and  capacity.  The  General  Court, 
instead  of  surrendering  the  provincial  patent,  transmitted  a 
petition  to  the  parliament  against  the  obnoxious  mandate,  set 
ting  forth,  that  "these  things  not  being  done  in  the  late  king's 
time  or  since,  it  was  not  able  to  discern  the  need  of  such  an 
injunction."  It  represented  the  authority  and  understanding 
on  which  the  colonists  originally  repaired  to  New  England, 
their  steadfast  adherence  to  the  cause  of  the  parliament 
throughout  the  civil  wars,  and  their  present  explicit  recognition 
of  its  supremacy  ;  and  prayed  that  the  people  might  not  now 
be  worse  dealt  with  than  in  the  time  of  the  king,  and,  instead  of 
a  governor  and  magistrates  annually  chosen  by  themselves,  be 
required  to  submit  to  others  imposed  on  them  against  their 
will. 

The  General  Court  at  the  same  time  addressed  a  letter  to 
"  the  Lord  General  Cromwell,"  for  the  purpose  of  interesting 
his  powerful  mediation  in  their  behalf,  as  well  as  of  dissuading 
him  from  the  prosecution  of  certain  measures  which  he  himself 
had  projected  for  their  advantage.  The  peculiar  character 
which  the  New  England  colonists  displayed,  the  institutions 
they  established,  and  their  predilection  for  the  independent 
model  of  church  government  which  he  himself  approved,  rec 
ommended  them  warmly  to  the  esteem  of  this  extraordinary 
man  ;  and  his  favorable  regards  were  enhanced  by  the  recol 
lection  of  the  project  which  he  had  conceived,  and  so  nearly 
accomplished,  of  uniting  his  destiny  with  theirs  in  America. 
Nor  were  they  at  all  abated  by  the  compassion  and  benevo 
lence  with  which  the  colonists  received  a  considerable  body  of 
unfortunate  Scots  whom  Cromwell  banished  to  Massachusetts 
after  the  battle  of  Dunbar,  and  of  which  he  was  apprized  by 
a  letter  from  John  Cotton.  He  seemed  to  consider  that  he 
had  been  detained  in  England  for  their  interests  as  well  as  his 
own  ;  and  never  ceased  to  desire  that  they  should  be  more 
nearly  associated  with  his  fortunes,  and  more  warmly  cheered 
with  the  rays  of  his  grandeur.  He  was  touched  with  a  gener 
ous  ambition  to  be  the  author  of  an  enterprise  so  illustrious  as 
the  revocation  of  these  men  to  their  native  country  ;  and  as  an 
act  of  honorable  justice  to  them,  as  well  as  for  the  advantage 


I  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

of  Ireland,  he  had  recently  broached  the  proposal  of  trans 
porting  them  from  America,  and  establishing  them  in  a  district 
of  that  island,  which  was  to  be  evacuated  for  their  reception. 
In  their  letter  to  him,  the  General  Court,  alluding  to  this 
scheme,  acknowledged,  with  grateful  expressions,  the  kind 
consideration  which  it  indicated  ;  but  declined  to  comply  with 
it,  or  abandon  a  land  where  they  had  experienced  so  much  of 
the  favor  of  God,  and  were  blessed  with  a  fair  prospect  of 
converting  the  neighbouring  heathens.  They  recommended, 
at  the  same  time,  their  petition  against  the  parliamentary  meas 
ures  to  his  friendly  countenance,  and  besought  "his  Excellence 
to  be  pleased  to  show  whatsoever  God  shall  direct  him  unto, 
on  the  behalf  of  the  colony,  to  the  most  honorable  parliament." 
It  is  probable  that  Cromwell's  mediation  was  successfully  em 
ployed,  as  the  requisition  that  had  been  addressed  to  the  Gen 
eral  Court  was  not  urged  any  farther.1 

The  successes  of  the  Long  Parliament  produced  or  pro 
moted  in  its  leading  members  a  domineering  spirit,  to  the  exer 
cise  of  which  the  colonies  were  peculiarly  exposed.  [1652.2] 
In  the  history  of  Virginia,  we  have  remarked  the  laws  by  which 
the  traffic  of  all  the  colonies  with  foreign  states  was  prohibited, 
and  the  martial  counsel  and  conduct  by  which  the  subjugation 

1  Hutchinson.  Hutchinson's  Collection  of  Papers.  Chalmers.  The  com 
missioners  who  were  sent  to  New  England  by  Charles  the  Second  asserted,  in 
their  narrative,  that  the  colonists  of  Massachusetts  solicited  Cromwell  to  de 
clare  it  an  independent  state.  Hutchinson's  Collection  of  Papers.  This  is  a 
very  improbable  statement,  and  was  suggested,  perhaps,  by  misrepresentation 
or  misapprehension  of  the  circumstances  related  in  the  text.  The  publication 
of  Governor  Winthrop's  Journal  has  now  clearly  proved  that  the  leading  men 
in  Massachusetts  entertained  from  the  beginning  a  considerable  jealousy  of 
parliamentary  jurisdiction.  "In  1641,"  says  Winthrop,  "some  of  our  friends 
in  England  wrote  to  us  advice  to  send  over  some  to  solicit  for  us  in  the  parlia 
ment, —  giving  us  hopes  that  we  might  obtain  much  ;  but,  consulting  about  it, 
we  declined  the  motion  for  this  consideration,  —  that,  if  we  should  put  our 
selves  under  the  protection  of  the  parliament,  we  must  then  be  subject  to  all 
such  laws  as  they  should  make,  or,  at  least,  such  as  they  might  impose  upon 
us ;  in  which  course,  though  they  should  intend  our  good,  yet  it  might  prove 
very  prejudicial  to  us."  Hence  it  is  obvious,  that  the  people  of  New  England, 
in  acknowledging  the  supremacy  of  parliament,  had  respect  to  it,  not  as  a  le 
gislative  body,  but  as  administering  the  functions  of  supreme  executive  power. 
They  never  willingly  admitted  that  the  mother  country  possessed  a  legislative 
control  over  them ;  or  that,  in  forsaking  her  shores,  they  left  behind  them  an 
authority  capable  of  obstructing  or  defeating  the  objects  of  their  migration. 

*  This  year,  Massachusetts  lost  its  eminent  preacher  and  patriarch,  John 
Cotton.  Finding  himself  dying,  he  sent  for  the  magistrates  and  ministers  of 
the  colony,  and,  with  much  solemnity  and  tenderness,  bade  them  farewell  for 
a  while. 


CHAP.  III.]  FAVOR  OF  CROMWELL  TO  NEW  ENGLAND.     293 

of  that  refractory  settlement  was  decreed  and  accomplished. 
The  province  of  Massachusetts,  which  was  desirous,  as  far  as 
possible,  to  act  in  harmonious  concurrence  with  the  parliament, 
and  was  perfectly  sincere  in  recognizing  its  supremacy,  coop 
erated  with  the  ordinance  against  Virginia,  by  prohibiting  all 
intercourse  with  this  colony  till  it  was  reduced  by  the  parlia 
mentary  forces.  But  it  was  not  over  those  settlements  alone 
which  opposed  its  supremacy  that  the  parliament  was  disposed 
to  indulge  the  spirit  of  domination  ;  and  though  Massachusetts 
was  protected  from  its  undesirable  handling  by  the  interference 
of  Cromwell,  Maryland,  which  had  received  its  establishment 
from  Charles  the  First,  was  compelled  to  admit  the  alterations 
of  its  official  style  which  Massachusetts  evaded  ;  and  Rhode 
Island  beheld  the  very  form  of  government  which  it  derived 
from  the  parliament  itself,  in  1643,  suspended  by  a  warrant  of 
the  council  of  state.  What  might  have  ensued  upon  this  war 
rant,  and  what  similar  or  ulterior  proceedings  might  have  been 
adopted  by  the  parliament  relative  to  the  other  colonies,  were 
intercepted  by  its  own  dissolution,  and  the  convergence  of  the 
whole  authority  of  the  English  commonwealth  in  the  powerful 
hands  of  Oliver  Cromwell.1  [1653.] 

The  ascendency  of  this  great  usurper  (the  perfidious  servant, 
yet  magnanimous  master,  of  his  country)  proved  highly  bene 
ficial  to  all  the  American  colonies,  except  Maryland,  where, 
unfortunately,  it  was  rendered  instrumental  to  much  injustice, 
discord,  and  confusion.  Rhode  Island,  immediately  after  his 
elevation  to  the  protectorate,  resumed  the  form  of  government 
which  the  parliament  had  recently  suspended  ;  and,  by  the 
decisive  vigor  of  his  interference,  the  people  of  Connecticut 
and  New  Haven  were  relieved  from  the  apprehensions  they 
had  long  entertained  of  the  hostile  designs  of  the  Dutch  colo 
nists  of  New  York.  All  the  New  England  States  were  thence 
forward  exempted  from  the  operation  of  the  parliamentary 
ordinance  against  trade  with  foreign  nations  ;  and  both  their 
commerce  and  their  security  were  promoted  by  the  conquest, 
which  the  protector's  arms  achieved,  of  the  province  of  Acadia 
from  the  French.  But  it  was  Massachusetts  that  occupied  the 

1  Chalmers. 


294  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

highest  place  in  his  esteem  ;  and  to  the  inhabitants  of  this  set 
tlement  he  earnestly  longed  to  impart  a  dignity  of  civil  condi 
tion  corresponding  to  the  elevation  which  he  believed  them  to 
enjoy  in  the  favor  of  the  great  Sovereign  of  the  universe.  The 
reasons  for  which  they  had  declined  his  offer  of  a  settlement 
in  Ireland,  however  likely  to  obtain  his  acquiescence,  were 
still  more  calculated  to  enlarge  his  regard  for  a  people  who 
were  actuated  by  such  generous  considerations.  When  his 
arms  had  achieved  the  conquest  of  Jamaica,  he  conceived  the 
project  of  transplanting  the  colonists  of  Massachusetts  to  that 
island  [1655]  ;  and,  with  this  view,  he  represented  to  them, 
that,  by  establishing  themselves  and  their  principles  in  the 
West  Indies,  they  would  carry  the  sword  of  the  gospel  into 
the  very  heart  of  the  territories  of  popery,  and  that  conse 
quently  they  ought  to  deem  themselves  as  strongly  invited  to 
this  ulterior  removal,  as  they  had  been  to  their  original  migra 
tion.  He  endeavoured  to  incite  them  to  embrace  this  project 
by  assurances  of  the  countenance  and  support  which  he  would 
extend  to  them,  and  of  the  amplest  delegation  of  the  powers 
of  government  in  their  new  settlement,  as  well  as  by  descant 
ing  on  the  rich  productions  of  the  torrid  zone,  with  which  their 
industry  would  be  rewarded  ;  and  with  these  considerations  he 
blended  an  appeal  to  their  conscience,  in  pressing  them  to 
fulfil,  in  their  own  favor,  the  promise  of  the  Almighty  to  make 
his  people  the  head,  and  not  the  tail.1  He  not  only  urged 
these  views  upon  the  agents  and  correspondents  of  the  colo 
nists  in  England,  but  despatched  one  of  his  own  confidential 
officers  to  Massachusetts  to  solicit  their  compliance  with  his 
proposal.  But  the  colonists  were  exceedingly  averse  to  aban 
don  a  country  where  they  found  themselves  happy  and  in  pos 
session  of  a  sphere  of  increasing  usefulness  and  virtue  ;  and 
the  proposal  was  the  more  unacceptable  to  them  from  the 
unfavorable  reports  they  received  of  the  climate  of  Jamaica. 
The  General  Court,  accordingly,  returned  an  address,  declin 
ing,  in  the  name  of  their  fellow-citizens,  to  embrace  the  pro 
tector's  offer  [1656],  and  withal  beseeching  his  Highness  not 
to  impute  their  refusal  to  indifference  to  his  service,  or  an  un- 

1  He  alluded,  I  suppose,  to  Deuteronomy  xxviii.,  13. 


CHAP.  III.]  PROJECTS   FOR  REMOVAL.  295 

grateful  disregard  of  his  concern  for  their  welfare.1  Thus, 
happily  for  themselves,  were  the  colonists,  on  two  several 
occasions,  deterred  from  acceding  to  the  proposals  of  Crom 
well  for  the  advancement  of  their  welfare  and  dignity.  Had 
they  removed  to  Ireland,  they  would  have  incurred  in  the 
sequel  a  diminution  both  of  happiness  and  liberty  ;  had  they 
proceeded  to  Jamaica,  they  would  have  been  exposed,  amidst 
the  prevalence  of  negro  slavery,  to  circumstances  highly  un 
favorable  to  piety  and  virtue.  In  the  mind  of  Cromwell,  a 
vehement  ardor  was  singularly  combined  with  the  most  pro 
found  and  deliberate  sagacity ;  and  enthusiastic  sentiments  were 
not  unfrequently  blended  with  politic  considerations,  in  propor 
tions  which  it  is  little  likely  that  he  himself  was  aware  of,  or 
that  any  remote  spectator  of  his  actions  can  accurately  adjust. 
It  is  obvious,  on  the  one  hand,  that  his  propositions  to  the 
colonists  were  connected  with  the  securer  establishment  of  his 
own  dominion  in  Ireland  and  the  preservation  of  his  conquest 
in  the  West  Indies.  But  it  is  equally  certain,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  the  colonists  incurred  neither  his  displeasure,  nor 
even  abatement  of  his  cordial  regard,  by  thus  refusing  to  pro 
mote  schemes  on  which  he  was  strongly  bent.  Nay,  so  pow 
erfully  had  they  captivated  his  steady  heart,  that  they  retained 
his  favor,  even  while  their  intolerance  discredited  the  inde 
pendent  principles  which  he  and  they  united  in  professing  ;  and 
none  of  the  complaints  against  them,  with  which  he  was  long 
assailed  by  the  Anabaptists  and  Quakers,  whose  conduct  and 
treatment  in  the  colony  we  are  now  to  consider,  could  ever 
deprive  the  people  of  the  place  they  had  gained  in  the  protec 
tor's  esteem. 

The  colonists  had  been  of  late  years  involved  occasionally 
in  hostilities  with  some  of  the  Indian  tribes,  and  in  disputes 
with  the  Dutch,  by  whose  machinations  they  suspected  that 
the  Indians  were  prompted  to  attack  them.  But  these  events 

1  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Hazard.  A  similar  answer  was  returned  by 
New  Haven  to  a  similar  application  from  the  protector.  Trumbull.  There 
were  not  wanting  some  wild  spirits  among  the  colonists,  who  relished  Crom 
well's  proposals.  The  notorious  Venner,  who  headed  the  insurrection  of  the 
Fifth  Monarchy  Men  in  England  after  the  Restoration,  was  for  some  time  an 
inhabitant  of  Salem,  and  prevailed  with  a  party  of  zealots  there  to  unite  in  a 
scheme  of  emigration  to  the  West  Indies.  But  the  design  was  discouraged  by 
the  clergy,  and  intercepted  by  the  magistrates.  Oldmixon. 


296  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

were  productive  of  greater  alarm  than  injury  ;  and  by  far  the 
most  serious  troubles  with  which  the  colonists  were  infested 
arose  from  religious  dissensions.  Of  all  the  instances  of  per 
secution  that  deform  the  history  of  New  England,  the  most 
censurable  in  its  principle,  though  happily  also  the  least  inhu 
man  in  the  severity  to  which  it  mounted,  was  the  treatment 
inflicted  on  the  Anabaptists  by  the  government  of  Massachu 
setts.  The  first  apparition  of  these  sectaries  in  the  province 
occurred  in  the  year  1651,  when,  to  the  great  astonishment 
and  concern  of  the  community,  seven  or  eight  persons,  of 
whom  the  leader  was  one  Obadiah  Holmes,  professed  the  Bap 
tist  tenets,  and  separated  from  the  congregation  to  which  they 
had  previously  belonged,  protesting  that  they  could  no  longer 
take  counsel,  or  partake  divine  ordinances,  with  unbaptized 
men,  as  they  pronounced  all  the  other  inhabitants  of  the  prov 
ince  to  be.  The  peculiar  doctrine  which  thus  unexpectedly 
sprung  up  was  at  that  time  regarded  with  extreme  aversion 
and  jealousy,  on  account  of  the  horrible  enormities  wherewith 
the  first  professors  of  it  in  Germany  had  associated  its  repute  ;l 
and  no  sooner  did  Holmes  and  his  friends  establish  a  Baptist 
conventicle  in  Massachusetts,  than  complaints  of  their  conduct, 
as  a  scandalous  and  intolerable  nuisance,  came  pouring  into  the 
General  Court  from  all  quarters  of  the  colony. 

From  the  tenor  of  these  complaints,  it  is  manifest  that  the 
minds  of  the  colonists  were  strongly  impressed  with  the  recol 
lection  of  the  licentious  sentiments  and  infamous  practices  by 
which  the  wretched  Boccold  and  his  insane  followers  at  Mun- 
ster  had  sullied  and  discredited  the  Baptist  tenets  ;  and  that  the 
bare  profession  of  these  tenets  was  calculated  to  awaken  sus 
picions  of  the  grossest  immorality  of  conduct.  Holmes  was 
accused  of  having  dishonored  the  Almighty,  not  only  by  dividing 
his  people  and  resisting  his  ordinance,  but  by  the  commission 
of  profligate  impurities,  and  the  gross  indecency  with  which, 
it  was  alleged,  the  rite  distinctive  of  his  sect  was  adminis 
tered.  It  is  admitted  by  the  provincial  historians,  that  no 

1  See  Robertson's  History  of  Charles  the  Fifth.  The  primitive  Anabaptists 
have  been  not  unhappily  termed  the  Jacobins  of  the  Reformation.  Violence 
and  exaggeration,  prejudicial  alike  to  the  interests  of  religion  and  liberty,  are 
incident  to  all  great  awakenings  and  revolutions  of  human  sentiment  and 
opinion. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE  BAPTISTS.  297 

sufficient  evidence  was  adduced  in  support  of  these  latter 
charges.  The  Court  refused  to  hearken  to  the  plea  of  liberty 
of  conscience  in  behalf  of  Holmes  and  his  followers,  but,  in 
the  first  instance,  exerted  its  authority  no  farther  against  their 
persons,  than  to  adjudge  that  they  should  desist  from  their 
unchristian  separation  ;  and  they  were  permitted  to  retire, 
having  first,  however,  publicly  declared  that  they  were  deter 
mined  to  pursue  the  dictates  of  their  conscience,  and  to  obey 
God  rather  than  man.  Some  time  after,  they  were  appre 
hended  on  a  Sunday,  while  attending  the  ministry  of  one  Clark, 
a  Baptist,  from  Rhode  Island,  who  had  come  to  propagate  his 
tenets  in  Massachusetts.  The  constables  who  took  them  into 
custody  carried  them  to  one  of  the  congregational  churches, 
where  Clark  put  on  his  hat  as  soon  as  the  clergyman  began  to 
pray.  Clark,  Holmes,  and  another  were  sentenced  to  pay 
small  fines,  or  to  be  flogged  ;  and  thirty  lashes  were  actually 
inflicted  on  Holmes,  who  resolutely  persisted  in  choosing  a 
punishment  that  would  enable  him  to  evince  the  constancy  with 
which  he  could  suffer  for  the  rights  of  conscience  and  the  de 
fence  of  what  he  conceived  to  be  truth.  A  law  was  at  the 
same  time  passed,  subjecting  to  banishment  from  the  colony 
every  person  who  should  openly  condemn  or  oppose  the  bap 
tism  of  infants,  —  who  should  attempt  to  seduce  others  from  the 
practice  or  approbation  of  infant  baptism,  —  or  ostentatiously 
depart  from  a  church  when  that  rite  was  administered,  —  "  or 
deny  the  ordinance  of  the  magistracy,  or  their  lawful  right  or 
authority  to  make  tear."1 

From  these  last  words,  it  seems  that  the  Baptists  (naturally, 
or  at  least  naturally  accounted,  inimical  to  the  authority  of  their 
oppressors)  either  held,  or  were  reputed  to  hold,  along  with 
the  proper  tenets  from  whence  they  derived  their  denomination, 
principles  opposed  to  the  acknowledgment  of  magisterial  power 
and  authority.  In  addition  to  this,  we  are  assured  by  Cotton 
Mather,  that  it  was  the  practice  of  the  Baptists,  in  order  to 
multiply  their  partisans,  and  manifest  their  contempt  for  the 
ecclesiastical  institutions  of  the  colonists,  to  admit  the  fellow 
ship  of  all  persons  whom  the  established  churches  in  New  Eng- 

1  Mather.     Neal. 
VOL.  i.  38 


298  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

land  had  excommunicated  for  licentiousness  of  conduct,  and 
even  to  appoint  such  persons  administrators  of  the  sacramental 
rites.  Yet,  even  with  these  and  other  extenuating  considera 
tions,  it  is  impossible  to  acquit  the  government  of  Massachu 
setts  of  having  violated  in  this  instance  the  rights  of  conscience, 
and  molested  men  for  the  fidelity  with  which  they  adhered  to 
what  they  firmly  believed  to  be  the  will  of  God,  in  relation  to 
a  matter  purely  ecclesiastical.1  The  greediness  with  which 
every  collateral  charge  against  the  Baptists  was  received  in  the 
colony,  and  the  passionate  impatience  with  which  their  claim 
of  toleration  was  rejected,  forcibly  indicate  the  illiberality  and 
delusion  by  which  their  persecutors  were  governed  ;  and  may 
suggest  to  the  Christian  philosopher  a  train  of  reflections,  no 
less  instructive  than  interesting,  on  the  self-deceit  by  which  men 
commonly  infer  the  honesty  of  their  convictions,  and  the  recti 
tude  of  their  proceedings,  from  that  resentful  perturbation 
which  far  more  truly  indicates  a  latent  consciousness  of  injus 
tice  and  inconsistency. 

It  is  mortifying  to  behold  such  tares  spring  up  in  a  field 
already  so  richly  productive  of  missionary  exertion  and  other 
fruits  of  genuine  and  exalted  piety.  The  severities  that  were 
employed  proved  in  the  sequel  incompetent  to  restrain  the 
spread  of  the  Baptist  tenets  ;  though  for  the  present  the  pro 
fessors  of  these  doctrines  appear  to  have  either  desisted  from 
holding  separate  assemblies,  or  to  have  retired  from  Massa 
chusetts.  Some  of  them  repaired  to  England,  and  complained 
to  Cromwell  of  the  persecution  they  had  undergone  ;'  but,  in 
stead  of  espousing  their  sentiment,  he  rejected  their  supplica 
tion,  and  applauded  the  conduct  of  the  provincial  authorities.2 

The  treatment  which  the  Quakers  experienced  in  Massa 
chusetts  was  much  more  severe,  but  certainly  much  more 

1  The  Baptists  who  were  exiled  from  Massachusetts  were  allowed  to  settle 
in  the  colony  of  Plymouth  (Hutchinson),  —  whence  it  may  be  inferred  that 
they  did  not  in  reality  profess  (as  they  were  supposed  by  the  people  of  Massa 
chusetts  to  do)  principles  adverse  to  civil  subordination.  This  charge  against 
them  probably  originated  in  the  extravagance  of  a  few  of  their  own  number, 
and  the  impatience  and  injustice  of  their  adversaries. 

The  government  of  Massachusetts  was  by  no  means  inquisitorial  in  its  in 
tolerance.  Dunster,  the  first  president  of  Harvard  College,  was  deprived  of 
this  office,  not  for  entertaining,  but  for  refusing  to  desist  from  teaching,  the 
Baptist  tenets  which  he  had  embraced.  —  Peirce. 

*  Hutchinson. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE   QUAKERS.  299 

justly  provoked.  It  is  difficult  for  us,  in  the  calm  and  rational 
deportment  of  the  Quakers  of  the  present  age,  to  recognize  the 
successors  of  those  wild  enthusiasts  who  first  appeared  in  the 
North  of  England,  about  the  year  1644,  and  received  from  the 
derision  of  the  world  the  title  which  they  afterwards  adopted 
as  their  sectarian  denomination.  In  the  mind  of  George  Fox, 
the  collector  of  this  sect,  and  the  founder  of  its  system  of  faith, 
there  existed  a  singular  mixture  of  Christian  sentiment  and 
doctrinal  truth  with  a  deep  shade  of  error  and  delusion. 
Profoundly  pious  and  contemplative,  but  constitutionally  vis 
ionary  and  hypochondriacal,  he  at  first  suspected  that  the 
peculiarities  of  his  mental  impressions  might  be  derived  from 
some  malady  which  human  science  or  friendly  suggestion  could 
remove  ;  and  an  old  clergyman,  to  whom  he  applied  for  coun 
sel,  advised  him  to  attempt  a  cure  of  what  was  spiritual  in  his 
disorder  by  singing  psalms,  and  of  what  was  bodily  by  smoking 
tobacco.1  Fox  rejected  both  parts  of  the  prescription,  as  un 
suitable  to  his  condition,  because  disagreeable  to  his  taste  ; 
and  being  now  convinced  that  others  were  incapable  of  under 
standing  his  case,  he  took  it  entirely  into  his  own  hands,  and 
resolved  to  study,  cherish,  and  cultivate  the  vague,  mysterious 
motions  of  his  spirit,  —  in  short,  to  follow  the  impulse  of  his 
restless  humor  as  far  as  it  would  lead  him.  Unsuspicious  of 
morbid  influence,  or  of  the  deceitfulness  of  his  own  imagination, 
he  yielded  implicit  credence  to  every  suggestion  of  his  mind, 
mistook  every  impulse  for  inspiration,  and  was  given  up  in  an 
amazing  degree  to  delusions,  which,  by  prayer  to  the  Almighty, 
he  might  have  been  enabled  to  overcome  and  dispel.  Yet  the 
powerful  hold  which  the  Scriptures  had  already  taken  of  his 
mind,  and  the  strong  determination  towards  solid  and  genuine 
piety  which  his  spirit  thence  derived,  prevented  him  from  per 
sonally  wandering  into  the  same  monstrous  extravagance  which 
the  conduct  of  many  of  his  associates  and  disciples  too  soon 
disclosed.  In  his  Journal  (one  of  the  most  curious  and  inter 
esting  productions  of  the  human  mind) ,  he  has  faithfully  related 
the  influence  which  his  tenets  produced  on  the  sentiments  and 
conduct  both  of  himself  and  his  followers.  This  singular  rec- 

1  Fox's  Journal. 


300  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

ord  displays,  in  many  parts,  a  wonderful  depth  of  thought  and 
keenness  of  penetration,  together  with  numberless  examples  of 
that  delusion  by  which  its  author  mistook  a  strong  perception 
of  wrong  and  disorder  in  human  nature  and  civil  society  for  a 
supernatural  vocation  and  power  to  rectify  whatever  he  deemed 
amiss.  He  relates  with  deliberate  approbation  various  in 
stances  of  contempt  of  decency  and  order  in  his  own  conduct, 
and  of  insane  and  disgusting  outrage  in  that  of  his  followers  ; 
and  though  he  reprobates  the  frenzy  of  some  whom  he  denom 
inates  Ranters,  it  is  not  easy  to  discriminate  between  the  ex 
travagance  which  he  sanctions  and  that  which  he  condemns. 
Amidst  much  darkness,  there  glimmers  a  bright  and  beautiful 
ray  of  religious  truth  ;  many  passages  of  Scripture  are  illus 
trated  with  happy  sagacity  ;  and  labors  of  zeal  and  piety,  of 
courage  and  integrity,  are  recorded,  that  would  do  honor  to 
the  ministry  of  an  inspired  apostle.  That  his  personal  charac 
ter  was  elevated  and  excellent  in  an  unusual  degree  appears 
from  the  impression  it  produced  on  the  minds  of  all  who  ap 
proached  him.  Penn  and  Barclay,  in  particular,  who  to  the 
most  eminent  virtue  added  talents  and  accomplishments  of  the 
first  order,  regarded  Fox  with  the  warmest  love  and  venera 
tion.1  He  was,  perhaps,  the  only  founder  of  any  religious 
sect  or  order,  in  whom  no  lust  of  power,  no  lurking  sentiment 
of  selfish  or  ambitious  aspiration,  was  ever  discovered. 

It  was  this  man  who  first  embraced  and  promulgated  those 
tenets  which  have  subsisted  ever  since  as  the  distinctive  princi 
ples  of  Quaker  doctrine  ;  —  that  the  Holy  Spirit,  instead  of 
operating  (as  the  generality  of  Christians  believe  it  in  all  or 
dinary  cases  to  do)  by  insensible  control  of  the  bent  and  exer 
cise  of  our  faculties,  acts  by  direct  and  cognizable  impulse  on 
the  spirit  of  man  ;  that  its  influence,  instead  of  being  obtained 
in  requital  or  accompaniment  of  believing  prayer  to  God,  is 
procured  by  an  introversion  of  the  intellectual  eye  upon  the 
mind  where  it  already  resides,  and  in  the  stillness  and  watchful 
attention  of  which  the  hidden  spark  will  blaze  into  a  clear  in 
ward  light  and  sensible  flame  ;  and  that  the  Holy  Spirit,  instead 
of  simply  opening  the  minds  of  men  to  understand  the  Scrip- 

1  See  Note  VIII.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE   QUAKERS.  301 

tures  and  receive  their  testimony,  can  and  does  convey  instruc 
tion    independently    of    the   written   word,   and  communicate 
knowledge  which  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  pages  of  holy  writ. 
The  Quaker  regulations  with  respect  to  plainness  of  speech 
and  apparel,  abstinence  from  music  and  other  amusements,  and 
general  simplicity  of  manners,  are  too  well  known  and  too  little 
pertinent  to  our  purpose,  to  require   that  they  should  here  be 
particularly  described.     We  may,  however,  with  propriety  re 
mark,  that  the  precepts  injunctive  of  plainness   of  apparel  re 
ceived  very  early  a   practical  interpretation  in  some  respects 
contradictory  of  their  own  intendment.     Forbidden  to  court  an 
arrogant  distinction  by  fineness   of  apparel,  the   Quakers  soon 
procured  to  themselves  a  distinction,  ridiculous   indeed,  yet  of 
great  and  mixed  importance,   by  adopting  and   retaining   the 
plainest  garb  exemplified  by  the   tasteless  fashion  of  one  par 
ticular  age  ;  and,  instead  of  the  modesty  of  simple  attire,  chal 
lenged  the   general  gaze   by  ostentatious  adherence  to  a  sec 
tarian  uniform  or  livery.     The  doctrinal  errors  to  which  we 
have    alluded   have  never   been   renounced  by  the    Quakers, 
though  their  practical  influence  has  long  since  abated,  and,  in 
deed,  had  considerably  declined  before  the  end  of  that  century 
in  the  middle  of  which  they  arose.     In  proportion  as  they  have 
been  cultivated  and  practically  regarded,  has  been  the  progress 
of  the  sect  into   pestilent  heresy  of  opinion,  wild   delusion  of 
fancy,  and  outrageous  extravagance  of  conduct  ;  in  proportion 
as  they  have   subsided  into  mere  theoretical  speculation,  has 
been   the  ascendency  which  real  piety  or  rational  and  philo 
sophical  principle  has  obtained  over  the  minds  of  the  Quakers. 
Even  in  the  present  day,  we  behold  the  evil  influence  of 
those  erroneous  doctrines,  in  the  frequently  silent  meetings  of 
the  Quakers,  in  the  license  which  they  give  to  women  to  assume 
the  office  of  teachers  in  their  church,  and  in  the  rejection  of 
the  sacraments  so  distinctly  instituted   and   enjoined  in  Scrip 
ture.     But  when  the  doctrines  of  Quakerism  were  first  promul 
gated,  the  effects  which  they  produced  on  many  of  their  vota 
ries   far  exceeded  the   influence  to  which  modern  history  re 
stricts  them,  or  which  the  experience  of  a  rational   and  calcu 
lating  age  finds  it  easy  to  conceive.     In   England,  at  that  time, 
the  minds  of  men  were  in  a  state  of  feverish  agitation  and  ex- 


302  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

citement,  inflamed  with  the  rage  of  innovation,  strongly  imbued 
with  religious  sentiment,  and  yet  strongly  averse  to  restraint. 
The  bands  that  so  long  repressed  liberty  of  speech  being  sud 
denly  broken,  many  crude  thoughts  were  eagerly  broached, 
and  many  fantastic  notions  that  had  been  vegetating  in  the  un 
wholesome  shade  of  locked  bosoms  were  abruptly  brought  to 
light  ;  and  all  these  were  presented  to  the  souls  of  men  roused 
and  whetted  by  civil  war,  kindled  by  great  alarms  or  by  vast 
and  indeterminate  designs,  and  latterly  so  accustomed  to  par 
take  or  contemplate  the  most  surprising  changes,  that  with 
them  the  distinction  between  speculation  and  certainty  was 
considerably  effaced.  The  Presbyterians  alone,  or  nearly 
alone,  were  generally  willing  to  submit  to,  as  well  as  to  impose, 
restraint  on  the  lawless  license  of  speculation  ;  and  to  them 
the  doctrines  of  Quakerism,  from  their  earliest  announcement, 
were  the  objects  of  unmixed  disapprobation  and  even  abhor 
rence.  But  to  many  other  persons,  this  new  scheme,  opening 
a  wide  field  of  enthusiastic  conjecture,  and  presenting  itself 
without  the  restrictive  accompaniment  of  a  creed,  exhibited 
irresistible  attractions,  and  it  rapidly  absorbed  a  great  variety 
of  human  character  and  feeling. 

Before  many  years  had  elapsed,  the  numbers  of  the  Quakers 
were  enlarged,  and  their  tenets,  without  being  substantially  al 
tered,  were  moulded  into  a  more  systematic  shape,  by  such  an 
accession  of  philosophical  votaries,  as,  in  the  early  ages  of  the 
church,  Christianity  itself  derived  from  the  pretended  adoption 
and  real  adulteration  of  its  doctrines  by  the  disciples  of  the 
Alexandrian  school  of  Platonic  philosophy.  But  it  was  the 
wildest  and  most  enthusiastic  visionaries  of  the  age  whom 
Quakerism  counted  among  its  earliest  votaries,  and  to  whom  it 
afforded  a  sanction  and  stimulus  to  the  boldest  excursions  of 
unregulated  thought,  and  a  principle  that  was  adduced  to  con 
secrate  the  rankest  absurdity  of  conduct.  And,  accordingly, 
these  sectarians,  who  have  always  professed  and  inculcated 
the  maxims  of  inviolable  peace',  —  who,  not  many  years  after, 
were  accounted  a  society  of  philosophical  deists,  seeking  to 
pave  the  way  to  a  scheme  of  natural  religion,  by  allegorizing 
the  distinguishing  articles  of  the  Christian  faith,  —  and  who  are 
now  in  general  remarkable  for  a  guarded  composure  of  Ian- 


CHAP.  III.]  THE   QUAKERS.  3Q3 

guage,  an  elaborate  stillness  and  precision  of  demeanour,  and  a 
peculiar  remoteness  from  every  active  effort  to  make  prose 
lytes  to  their  distinctive  tenets,  —  were,  in  the  commencement 
of  their  sectarian  history,  the  most  impetuous  zealots  and  in 
veterate  disputers  ;  and  in  their  eagerness  to  proselytize  the 
world,  and  to  launch  testimony  from  the  fountain  of  oracular 
truth,  which  they  supposed  to  reside  within  their  own  bosoms, 
against  a  regular  ministry  which  they  called  a  priesthood  of 
Baal,  and  against  the  sacraments  which  they  termed  carnal  and 
idolatrous  observances,  many  of  them  committed  the  most  re 
volting  blasphemy,  indecency,  and  disorderly  outrage.1  The 
unfavorable  impression  which  these  actions  created  long  sur 
vived  the  extinction  of  the  frenzy  and  folly  that  produced  them. 
While,  in  pursuance  of  their  determination  to  proselytize  the 
whole  world,  some  of  the  Quakers  travelled  to  Rome,  in  order 
to  illuminate  the  pope,  and  others  to  Constantinople,  for  the 
purpose  of  converting  the  Grand  Turk,  —  a  party  of  them 
embarked  for  America  and  established  themselves  in  Rhode 
Island,  where  persons  of  every  religious  (Protestant)  denomi 
nation  were  permitted  to  settle  in  peace,  and  no  one  gave  heed 
to  the  sentiments  or  practices  of  his  neighbours.  From  hence 
they  soon  made  their  way  into  the  Plymouth  territory,  where 
they  succeeded  in  persuading  some  of  its  inhabitants  to  em 
brace  the  doctrine  that  a  sensible  experience  of  inward  light 
and  spiritual  impression  was  the  meaning  and  end  of  Chris 
tianity,  and  the  essential  characteristic  of  its  votaries,  —  and 
to  oppose  all  regulated  order,  forms,  and  discipline,  wheth 
er  civil  or  ecclesiastical,  as  a  vain  and  judaizing  substitution  of 
the  kingdom  of  the  flesh  for  the  kingdom  of  the  spirit.  On 
their  first  appearance  in  Massachusetts  [July,  1656],  where 
two  male  and  six'  female  Quakers  arrived  from  Rhode  Island 
and  Barbadoes,  they  found  that  the  reproach  entailed  on  their 

1  The  frenzy  that  possessed  many  of  the  Quakers  had  reached  its  height  in 
the  year  1656,  the  very  year  in  which  the  Quakers  first  presented  themselves 
in  Massachusetts.  See  the  proceedings  in  the  House  of  Commons  against 
James  Naylor,  a  Quaker,  for  blasphemy.  Howell's  State  Trials.  This  un 
happy  person  represented  himself  as  the  redeemer  of  the  human  race.  Some 
particulars  of  his  frenzy  are  related  in  Note  VIII.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 
He  lived  to  recant  his  errors,  and  even  write  sensibly  in  defence  of  the  Qua 
kers,  who  were  by  this  time  increasing  in  respectability,  and  were  yet  mag 
nanimous  enough  to  acknowledge  as  a  friend  and  associate  the  man  who  had 
done  such  disservice  to  their  cause. 


304  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

sect  by  the  insane  extravagance  of  some  of  its  members  in 
England  had  preceded  their  arrival,  and  that  they  were  regard 
ed  with  the  utmost  terror  and  dislike  by  the  great  bulk  of  the 
people.  They  were  instantly  arrested  by  the  magistrates,  and 
diligently  examined  for  what  were  considered  bodily  marks  of 
witchcraft.  No  such  indications  having  been  found,  they  were 
sent  back  to  the  places  whence  they  came,  by  the  same  ves 
sels  that  had  brought  them,  and  prohibited  with  threats  of  se 
vere  punishment  from  ever  again  returning  to  the  colony.  A 
law  was  passed  at  the  same  time,  subjecting  every  ship-master 
importing  Quakers  or  Quaker  writings  to  a  heavy  fine  ;  ad 
judging  all  Quakers  who  should  intrude  into  the  colony  to 
stripes  and  labor  in  the  house  of  correction,  and  all  defenders 
of  their  tenets  to  fine,  imprisonment,  or  exile. 

The  four  associated  States  adopted  this  law,  and  urged  the 
authorities  of  Rhode  Island  to  cooperate  with  them  in  stem 
ming  the  progress  of  Quaker  opinions  ;  but  the  assembly  of 
this  settlement  wisely  replied,  that  they  could  not  punish  any 
man  for  declaring  his  mind  with  regard  to  religion  ;  that  they 
were  much  incommoded  by  the  presence  of  the  Quakers,  and 
the  tendency  of  their  doctrines  to  unsettle  the  relations  of 
mankind  and  dissolve  the  bonds  of  society  ;  but  that  they 
found  that  the  Quakers  delighted  to  encounter  persecution, 
speedily  sickened  of  a  patient,  uncontradicting  audience,  and 
had  already  begun  to  loathe  Rhode  Island  as  a  scene  in  which 
their  talent  of  heroic  endurance  was  ingloriously  buried.1  It 

1  Gordon  and  other  writers  have  represented  the  letter  from  Rhode  Island 
to  Massachusetts  as  conveying  a  dignified  rebuke  of  intolerance,  and  have 
quoted  a  passage  to  this  effect,  which  they  have  found  somewhere  else  than 
in  the  letter  itself.  We  shall  find,  in  the  sequel,  that  the  forbearance  exerted 
by  the  government  of  that  province  towards  the  Quakers  did  not  last  many 
years.  ' 

Roger  Williams,  who  contributed  to  found  the  State  of  Rhode  Island,  en 
deavoured,  some  years  after  this  period,  to  extirpate  the  Quaker  heresy,  by 
challenging  certain  of  the  leaders  of  the  sect,  who  had  come  from  England  on 
a  mission  to  their  brethren,  to  hold  a  public  disputation  with  him  on  their 
tenets.  They  eagerly  accepted  his  challenge  ;  and  their  historians  assure  us, 
that  the  disputation,  which  lasted  for  several  days,  ended  "  in  a  clear  con 
viction  of  the  envy  and  prejudice  of  the  old  man.  Gough  and  Sewell's  His 
tory  of  the  Quakers.  It  is  more  probable,  that,  like  other  public  disputations, 
it  ended  as  it  began.  Williams  never  doubted  that  it  had  issued  in  his  own 
favor,  and  signalized  his  triumph  by  publishing  a  book  bearing  the  incourte- 
ous  title  of  George  Fox  digged  out  of  his  Burrow ;  to  which  Fox  promptly  re 
plied  by  a  publication  entitled,  A  New  England  Firebrand  quenched,  being  an 
Answer  to  a  lying,  slanderous  Book  by  one  Roger  Williams,  confuting  his  blas 
phemous  Assertions.  Eliot's  JVew  England  Biography. 


CHAP   III.]  THE    QUAKERS.  305 

is  much  to  be  lamented  that  the  counsel  insinuated  in  this 
good-humored  reply  was  not  embraced.  The  penal  enact 
ments  resorted  to  by  the  other  settlements  served  only  to  in 
flame  the  impatience  of  the  Quaker  zealots  to  carry  their  min 
istry  into  places  that  seemed  to  them  to  stand  so  greatly  in 
need  of  it  ;  and  the  persons  l  who  had  been  disappointed  in 
their  first  attempt  returned  almost  immediately  to  Massachu 
setts,  and,  dispersing  themselves  through  the  colony,  began  to 
proclaim  their  mystical  notions,  and  succeeded  in  communi 
cating  them  to  some  of  the  inhabitants  of  Salem.  They  were 
soon  joined  by  Mary  Clarke,  the  wife  of  a  tailor  in  London, 
who  announced  that  she  had  forsaken  her  husband  and  six 
children  in  order  to  convey  a  message  from  heaven,  which  she 
was  commissioned  to  deliver  to  New  England.  Instead  of 
joining  with  the  provincial  missionaries  in  attempts  to  reclaim 
the  neighbouring  savages  from  their  barbarous  superstition  and 
profligate  immoralities,  or  themselves  prosecuting  separate  mis 
sions  with  a  like  intent,  the  apostles  of  Quakerism  raised  their 
voices  in  vilification  of  every  thing  that  was  most  highly  ap 
proved  and  revered  in  the  doctrine  and  practice  of  the  pro 
vincial  churches.  Seized,  imprisoned,  and  flogged, — they 
were  again  dismissed  with  severer  threats  from  the  colony,  and 
again  they  returned  by  the  first  vessels  they  could  procure. 
The  government  and  a  great  majority  of  the  colonists  were  in 
censed  at  their  stubborn  pertinacity,  and  shocked  at  the  im 
pression  which  they  had  already  produced  on  some  minds, 
and  which  threatened  to  corrupt  and  subvert  a  system  of  pie 
ty,  whose  establishment,  fruition,  and  perpetuation  supplied 
their  fondest  recollections,  their  noblest  enjoyment,  and  most 
energetic  desire.  New  punishments  were  introduced  into  the 

1  Except  one  of  the  women,  Mary  Fisher,  who  travelled  to  Adrianople,  and 
had  an  interview  with  the  Grand  Vizier,  by  whom  she  was  received  with 
courteous  respect.  Bishop,  the  Quaker,  in  his  New  England  Judged,  observes, 
that  she  fared  better  among  heathens  than  her  associates  did  among  professing 
Christians.  He  was  perhaps  not  aware  that  the  Turks  regard  insane  persons 
as  inspired.  But,  whether  insane  or  not,  she  was  not  altogether  divested  of 
a  prudential  regard  to  her  own  safety ;  for,  "  when  they  asked  her  what  she 
thought  of  their  prophet  Mahomet,  she  made  a  cautious  reply,  that  she  knew 
him  not."  Kelsey,  another  Quaker,  displayed  less  prudence,  and  experienced 
less  courtesy  from  the  Turks.  He  preached  in  the  streets  of  Constantinople 
to  crowds  who  understood  not  one  word  of  his  language,  and,  by  the  advice 
of  Lord  Winchelsea,  the  English  ambassador  at  the  Porte,  was  punished  by 
the  Turkish  authorities  with  the  bastinado. 

VOL.  i.  39 


306  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

legislative  enactments  against  the  intrusion  of  Quakers  and  the 
profession  of  Quakerism  [1657]  ;  and,  in  particular,  the  abscis 
sion  of  an  ear  was  added  to  the  former  ineffectual  severities. 
Three  male  Quaker  preachers  endured  the  rigor  of  this  cruel 
law. 

But  all  the  exertions  of  the  provincial  authorities  proved 
unavailing,  and  seemed  rather  to  stimulate  the  zeal  of  the  ob 
noxious  sectaries  to  brave  the  danger  and  court  the  glory  of  per 
secution.  [1658.]  Swarms  of  Quakers  descended  upon  the 
colony  ;  and,  violent  and  impetuous  in  provoking  persecution, 
—  calm,  resolute,  and  inflexible  in  sustaining  it,  —  they  opposed 
their  power  of  enduring  cruelty  to  their  adversaries'  power  of  in 
flicting  it ;  and  not  only  multiplied  their  converts,  but  excited  a 
considerable  degree  of  favor  and  pity  in  the  minds  of  men, 
who,  detesting  the  Quaker  tenets,  yet  derived  from  their  own 
experience  a  peculiar  sympathy  with  the  virtues  of  heroic  pa 
tience,  constancy,  and  contempt  of  danger.  When  the  Quak 
ers  were  committed  to  the  house  of  correction,  they  refused 
to  work ;  when  they  incurred  pecuniary  fines,  they  refused  to 
pay  them.  In  the  hope  of  enforcing  compliance  with  its  mild 
er  requisitions,  the  court  adjudged  two  of  those  contumacious 
persons  to  be  sold  as  slaves  in  the  West  Indies;  but,  as  even 
this  dismal  prospect  could  not  move  their  stubborn  resolution, 
the  court,  instead  of  executing  its  inhuman  threat,  reverted  to 
the  unavailing  device  of  banishing  them  beyond  its  jurisdic 
tion.  It  was  by  no  slight  provocations  that  the  Quakers  at 
tracted  these  and  additional  severities  upon  themselves.  Men 
trembled  for  the  faith  and  morals  of  their  families  and  their 
friends,  when  they  heard  the  blasphemous  denunciations  that 
were  uttered  against  the  worship  of  "  a  carnal  Christ,"  and 
when  they  beheld  the  frantic  and  indecent  outrages  that  were 
prompted  by  the  mystical  impressions  which  the  Quakers  incul 
cated  and  professed  to  be  guided  by.  In  public  assemblies 
and  in  crowded  streets,  it  was  the  practice  of  some  of  the 
Quakers  to  denounce  the  most  tremendous  manifestations  of 
divine  wrath  on  the  people,  unless  they  forsook  their  carnal 
system.  One  of  them,  named  Faubord,  conceiving  that  he 
experienced  a  celestial  encouragement  to  rival  the  faith  and 
imitate  the  sacrifice  of  Abraham,  was  proceeding  with  his  own 


CHAP.  III.]  THE   QUAKERS.  307 

hands  to  shed  the  blood  of  his  son,  when  his  neighbours, 
alarmed  by  the  cries  of  the  lad,  broke  into  the  house  and  pre 
vented  the  consummation  of  this  blasphemous  atrocity.  Others 
interrupted  divine  service  in  the  churches  by  loudly  protesting 
that  these  were  not  the  sacrifices  that  God  would  accept ;  and 
one  of  them  illustrated  this  assurance  by  breaking  two  bottles 
in  the  face  of  the  congregation,  exclaiming,  "  Thus  will  the 
Lord  break  you  in  pieces  !  "  They  declared  that  the  Scrip 
tures  were  replete  with  allegory,  that  the  inward  light  was  the 
only  infallible  guide  to  religious  truth,  and  that  all  were  blind 
beasts  and  liars  who  denied  it. 

The  female  preachers  far  exceeded  their  male  associates  in 
folly,  frenzy,  and  indecency.  One  of  them  presented  herself 
to  a  congregation  with  her  face  begrimed  with  coal-dust, 
announcing  it  as  a  pictorial  illustration  of  the  black  pox,  which 
Heaven  had  commissioned  her  to  predict  as  an  approaching 
judgment  on  all  carnal  worshippers.  Some  of  them  in  rueful 
attire  perambulated  the  streets,  proclaiming  the  speedy  arrival 
of  an  angel  with  a  drawn  sword  to  plead  with  the  people  ;  and 
some  attempted  feats  that  may  seem  to  verify  the  legend  of 
Godiva  of  Coventry.  One  woman,  in  particular,  entered  stark 
naked  into  a  church  in  the  middle  of  divine  service,  and  de 
sired  the  people  to  take  heed  to  her  as  a  sign  of  the  times, 
and  an  emblem  of  the  unclothed  state  of  their  own  souls  ;  and 
her  associates  highly  extolled  her  submission  to  the  inward 
light,  that  had  revealed  to  her  the  duty  of  illustrating  the  spirit 
ual  nakedness  of  her  neighbours  by  the  indecent  exhibition  of 
her  own  person.  Another  Quakeress  was  arrested  as  she  was 
making  a  similar  display  in  the  streets  of  Salem.  The  horror, 
justly  inspired  by  these  insane  enormities,  was  inflamed  into 
the  most  vehement  indignation  by  the  deliberate  manner  in 
which  they  were  defended,  and  the  disgusting  profanity  with 
which  Scripture  was  linked  in  impure  association  with  notions 
and  behaviour  at  once  ridiculous  and  contemptible.  Among 
other  singularities,  the  Quakers  exemplified  and  inculcated  the 
forbearance  of  even  the  slightest  demonstration  of  respect  to 
courts  and  magistrates  ;  they  declared  that  governors,  judges, 
lawyers,  and  constables  were  trees  that  cumbered  the  ground, 
and  presently  must  be  cut  down,  in  order  that  the  true  light 


308  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

might  have  leave  to  shine  and  space  to  rule  alone  ;  and  they 
freely  indulged  every  sally  of  distempered  fancy  which  they 
could  connect,  however  absurdly,  with  the  language  of  the 
Bible.  A  Quaker  woman,  who  was  summoned  by  the  provin 
cial  court  to  answer  for  some  extravagance,  being  desired  to 
tell  where  she  lived,  refused  to  give  any  other  answer  than  that 
she  lived  in  God,  "  for  in  him  we  live,  and  move,  and  have  our 
being."  Letters  replete  with  coarse  and  virulent  railing  were 
addressed  by  other  members  of  the  sect  to  the  magistrates  of 
Boston  and  Plymouth.  Such  was  the  inauspicious  outset  of 
the  Quakers  in  America, — a  country,  where,  a  few  years  after, 
under  the  guidance  of  sounder  judgment  and  wiser  sentiment 
and  purpose,  they  were  destined  to  extend  the  empire  of  piety 
and  benevolence,  and  to  found  establishments  that  have  been 
largely  productive  of  happiness  and  virtue. 

It  has  been  asserted  by  some  of  the  modern  apologists  of  the 
Quakers,  that  these  frantic  excesses,  which  excited  so  much 
indignation  and  produced  such  tragical  consequences,  were 
committed,  not  by  genuine  Quakers,  but  by  the  Ranters,  or 
wild  separatists  from  the  Quaker  body.  Of  these  Ranters,  in 
deed,  a  very  large  proportion  certainly  betook  themselves  to 
America  ;  attracted  chiefly  by  the  glory  of  enduring  persecu 
tion,  —  but  in  some  instances,  perhaps,  by  the  hope  of  attain 
ing  among  their  brethren  in  that  country  a  distinction  from 
which  they  were  excluded  in  England  by  the  established  pre 
eminence  of  George  Fox.1  It  is  certain,  however,  that  the 
persons  whose  conduct  we  have  particularized  assumed  the 
name  of  Quakers,  and  traced  all  their  absurdities  to  the  pecu 
liar  Quaker  principle  of  searching  their  own  bosoms  for  sensi- 

1  One  of  the  most  noted  of  these  separatists  was  John  Perrot,  who,  in  order 
to  convert  the  pope,  had  made  a  journey  to  Italy,  where  he  was  confined  for 
some  time  as  a  lunatic.  This  persecution  greatly  endeared  him  to  the  Quakers, 
and  exalted  him  so  much  in  his  own  esteem,  that  he  began  to  consider  himself 
more  enlightened  than  George  Fox.  He  prevailed  with  a  considerable  party 
among  the  Quakers  to  refrain  from  shaving  their  beards,  and  to  reject  the 
practice  of  uncovering  their  heads  in  the  act  of  prayer,  as  a  vain  formality. 
Fox  having  succeeded,  by  dint  of  great  exertions,  in  stemming  these  innova 
tions,  Perrot  repaired  to  America,  where  he  appears  to  have  multiplied  his 
absurdities,  and  propagated  them  among  the  Quakers  to  an  amazing  extent. 
Various  missions  were  undertaken  by  George  Fox  and  other  English  Quakers 
to  reclaim  their  brethren  in  America  from  the  errors  of  Perrot,  who  finally 
abandoned  every  pretence  to  Quakerism,  and  became  a  strenuous  asserter  of 
all  the  doctrines  and  observances  against  which  he  had  formerly  borne  testi 
mony. —  Gough  and  Sewell. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE  QUAKERS.  309 

ble  admonitions  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  independent  of  the  Scrip 
tural  revelation  of  divine  will.  And  many  scandalous  outrages 
were  committed  by  persons  whose  profession  of  Quaker  prin 
ciples  was  recognized  by  the  Quaker  body,  and  whose  suffer 
ings  are  related,  and  their  frenzy  applauded,  by  the  pens  of 
Quaker  writers.1 

Exasperated  by  the  repetition  of  these  enormities,  and  the 
extent  to  which  the  contagion  of  their  radical  principle  was 
spreading  in  the  colony,  the  magistrates  of  Massachusetts,  in  the 
close  of  this  year  [1658],  introduced  into  the  assembly  a  law, 
denouncing  the  punishment  of  death  upon  all  Quakers  returning 
from  banishment.  This  legislative  proposition  was  opposed  by 
a  considerable  party  of  the  colonists  ;  and  various  individuals, 
who  would  have  hazarded  their  own  lives  to  extirpate  the 
heresy  of  the  Quakers,  solemnly  protested  against  the  cruelty 
and  iniquity  of  shedding  their  blood.  It  was  at  first  rejected 
by  the  assembly  ;  but  finally  adopted  by  the  narrow  majority 
of  a  single  voice.  In  the  course  of  the  two  following  years 
[1659,  1660],  this  barbarous  law  was  carried  into  execution  on 
three  separate  occasions,  —  when  four  Quakers,  three  men  and 
a  woman,  were  put  to  death  at  Boston.  It  does  not  appear 
that  any  of  these  unfortunate  persons  were  guilty  of  the  outrages 
which  the  conduct  of  their  brethren  in  general  had  associated 
with  the  profession  of  Quakerism.  Oppressed  by  the  prejudice 
created  by  the  frantic  conduct  of  others,  they  were  adjudged  to 
die  for  returning  from  banishment  and  continuing  to  preach  the 
Quaker  doctrines.  In  vain  the  court  entreated  them  to  accept 
a  pardon  on  condition  of  abandoning  for  ever  the  colony  from 
which  they  had  been  repeatedly  banished.  They  answered  by 
reciting  the  heavenly  call  to  continue  there,  which,  on  various 
occasions,  they  affirmed,  had  sounded  in  their  ears,  in  the  fields 
and  in  their  dwellings,  distinctly  syllabling  their  names,  and 
whispering  their  prophetic  office  and  the  scene  of  its  exercise.2 

1  See  Note  IX.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

1  The  first  Quakers,  instead  of  following  the  injunction  of  our  Saviour  to 
his  apostles,  that  when  persecuted  in  one  city  they  should  flee  to  another, 
seem  to  have  found  strong  attractions  in  the  prospect  of  persecution.  One  of 
those  who  were  put  to  death  in  Massachusetts  declared,  that,  as  he  was  hold 
ing  the  plough  in  Yorkshire,  he  was  directed  by  a  heavenly  voice  to  leave  his 
wife  and  children,  and  repair  to  Barbadoes ;  but  hearing  of  the  banishment  of 
the  Quakers  from  New  England,  and  of  the  severe  punishments  inflicted  on 
persons  returning  there  after  banishment,  he  began  to  ponder  on  the  proba- 


310  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

When  they  were  conducted  to  the  scaffold,  their  demeanour 
expressed  unquenchable  zeal  and  courage,  and  their  dying 
declarations  breathed  in  general  a  warm  and  affecting  piety.1 

These  executions  excited  much  clamor  against  the  govern 
ment  ;  many  persons  were  offended  by  the  exhibition  of  severi 
ties  against  which  the  establishment  of  the  colony  itself  seemed 
intended  to  bear  a  perpetual  testimony ;  and  many  were  touched 
with  an  indignant  compassion  for  the  sufferings  of  the  Quakers, 
that  effaced  all  recollection  of  the  indignant  disgust  which  the 
principles  of  these  sectaries  had  previously  inspired.  The 
people  began  to  flock  in  crowds  to  the  prisons,  and  load  the 
unfortunate  Quakers  with  demonstrations  of  kindness  and  pity. 
The  magistrates  at  first  attempted  to  combat  the  censure  they 
had  provoked,  and  published  a  vindication  of  their  proceedings, 
for  the  satisfaction  of  their  fellow-citizens  and  of  their  friends  in 
other  countries,  who  united  in  blaming  them  ;  but  at  length  the 
rising  sentiments  of  humanity  and  justice  attained  such  general 
and  forcible  prevalence,  as  to  overpower  all  opposition.  On 
the  trial  of  Leddra,  the  last  of  the  sufferers,  another  Quaker, 
named  Wenlock  Christison,  who  had  been  banished  with  the 
assurance  of  capital  punishment  in  case  of  his  return,  came 
boldly  into  court  with  his  hat  on,  and  reproached  the  magis 
trates  for  shedding  innocent  blood.  He  was  taken  into  custody, 
and  soon  after  brought  to  trial.  Summoned  to  plead  to  his 
indictment^  he  desired  to  know  by  what  law  the  court  was 
authorized  to  put  him  on  the  defence  of  his  life.  When  the 
last  enactment  against  the  Quakers  was  cited  to  him,  he  asked, 
who  empowered  the  provincial  authorities  to  make  that  law, 
and  whether  it  were  not  repugnant  to  the  jurisprudence  of 
England.  The  governor  answered,  with  little  regard  to  sense 
or  propriety,  that  an  existing  law  in  England  appointed  Jesuits 
to  be  hanged.  But  Christison  replied,  that  they  did  not  even 
accuse  him  of  being  a  Jesuit,  but  acknowledged  him  to  be  a 
Quaker,  and  that  there  was  no  law  in  England  that  made 

bility  of  his  receiving  a  spiritual  direction  to  proceed  thither,  and  very  soon 
after  received  it  accordingly.  —  Tomkins's  and  Kendall's  Lives,  Services,  and 
Dying  Sayings  of  the  Quakers. 

The  woman  who  was  executed  was  Mary  Dyer,  who,  twenty  years  before, 
had  been  a  follower  of  Mrs.  Hutchinson  and  a  disturber  of  New  England. 

1  There  is  a  striking  resemblance  between  the  dying  behaviour  of  these 
Quaker  martyrs  and  the  sublime  scene  delineated  in  2  Maccabees,  vi.  and  vii. 


CHAP.  III.]  THE  QUAKERS.  311 

Quakerism  a  capital  offence.  The  court,  nevertheless,  over 
ruled  his  plea,  and  the  jury  found  him  guilty.  When  sentence 
of  death  was  pronounced  upon  him,  he  desired  his  judges  to 
consider  what  they  had  gained  by  their  cruel  proceedings 
against  the  Quakers.  "  For  the  last  man  that  was  put  to 
death,"  said  he,  "here  are  five  come  in  his  room  ;  and  if  you 
have  power  to  take  my  life  from  me,  God  can  raise  up  the 
same  principle  of  life  in  ten  of  his  servants,  and  send  them 
among  you  in  my  room,  that  you  may  have  torment  upon  tor 
ment."  The  magnanimous  demeanour  of  this  man,  who  seems 
to  have  been  greatly  superior  in  understanding  to  the  bulk  of 
his  sectarian  associates,  produced  an  impression  which  could 
not  be  withstood.  The  law  now  plainly  appeared  to  be  unsup 
ported  by  public  consent,  and  the  magistrates  hastened  to  in 
terpose  between  the  sentence  and  its  execution.  Christison 
and  all  the  other  Quakers  who  were  in  custody  were  forthwith 
released  and  sent  beyond  the  precincts  of  the  colony  ;  and  as 
it  was  impossible  to  prevent  them  from  returning,  only  the 
minor  punishments  of  flogging  and  reiterated  exile  were  em 
ployed.  Even  these  penal  rigors  were  relaxed  in  proportion  as 
the  demeanour  of  the  Quakers  became  more  quiet  and  or 
derly  ;  and  in  the  first  year  after  the  restoration  of  Charles  the 
Second,  the  infliction  of  flogging  was  suspended  by  a  letter 
from  the  king  to  Governor  Endicott l  and  the  other  magistrates 
of  the  New  England  settlements,  requiring  that  no  Quakers 
should  thenceforward  undergo  any  corporal  punishment  in 
America,  but,  if  charged  with  offences  that  were  reckoned  de 
serving  of  such  severity,  they  should  be  remitted  for  trial  to 
England.  Happily,  the  moderation  of  the  provincial  govern 
ment  was  more  steady  and  durable  than  the  policy  of  the  king, 
who  retracted  his  interposition  in  behalf  of  the  Quakers  in  the 
course  of  the  following  year. 

The  persecution  thus  happily  closed  was  not  equally  severe 
in  all  the  New  England  States  ;  the  Quakers  suffered  most  in 

1  Endicott  was  in  an  especial  degree  the  object  of  dislike  to  Charles  the 
Second.  Hutchinson  relates,  that  he  had  seen  a  letter  from  the  secretary  of 
state,  some  time  after  this  period,  containing  an  intimation  that  "  the  king 
would  take  it  well,  if  the  people  would  leave  out  Mr.  Endicott  from  the  place 
of  governor."  But  the  people  continued  to  elect  him  to  this  office  as  long  as 
he  lived.  He  died  at  the  age  of  seventy-seven,  in  the  year  1665,  leaving  be 
hind  him  the  character  of  "a  sincere  Puritan."  —  Holmes. 


312  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Massachusetts  and  Plymouth,  and  comparatively  little  in  Con 
necticut  and  New  Haven.  It  was  only  in  Massachusetts  that 
the  inhuman  law  inflicting  capital  punishment  upon  them  was 
ever  carried  into  effect.1  At  a  subsequent  period,  the  laws 
relating  to  vagabond  Quakers  were  so  far  revived,  that  Quak 
ers  disturbing  religious  assemblies,  or  violating  public  decen 
cy,  were  subjected  to  corporal  chastisement.  But  little  occa 
sion  ever  again  occurred  of  executing  these  severities  ;  the 
wild  excursions  of  the  Quaker  spirit  having  generally  ceased, 
and  the  Quakers  gradually  subsiding  into  a  decent  and  orderly 
submission  to  all  the  laws,  except  such  as  related  to  the  militia 
and  the  support  of  the  clergy,  —  in  their  scruples  as  to  which 
the  provincial  legislature,  with  reciprocal  moderation,  consented 
to  indulge  them.2 

During  the  long  period  that  had  now  elapsed  since  the 
commencement  of  the  civil  war  in  Britain,  the  New  England 
provinces  experienced  a  steady  and  vigorous  growth,  in  respect 
both  of  the  numbers  of  their  inhabitants  and  the  extent  of 
their  territorial  occupation.  The  colonists  were  surrounded 
with  abundance  of  cheap  and  fertile  land,  and  secured  in  the 
enjoyment  of  that  ecclesiastical  estate  which  was  the  object  of 
their  supreme  desire,  and  of  civil  and  political  freedom.  They 
were  exempted  from  the  payment  of  all  taxes,  except  for  the 
support  of  their  internal  government,  which  was  conducted 
with  great  economy  ;  and  they  enjoyed  the  extraordinary 

1  This  law,  though  never  executed  in  Connecticut,  was  embraced  by  the 
assembly  of  this  province,  which  also  adjudged  that  "  No  food  or  lodging 
shall  be  afforded  to  a  Quaker,  Adamite,  or  other  heretic."  —  Blue  Laws  of 
Connecticut,  Art.  13  and  14. 

8  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Hazard.  Oldmixon.  Oldmixon, 
who  entertained  no  predilection  for  either  of  the  parties,  has  pronounced  this 
impartial  censure  on  the  treatment  which  the  Quakers  experienced  from  the 
Puritan  magistrates  of  New  England.  "  If  the  Quakers  ran  about  the  streets, 
crying  out  against  the  sins  of  the  people,  there  might  have  been  a  mad-house 
set  apart  for  them.  If  Deborah  Wilson  marched  through  Salem  stark  naked, 
the  hangman  might  have  flogged  her  with  the  more  advantage.  I  meet  with 
some  signs  of  frenzy  and  folly  in  the  rants  and  riots  of  the  Quakers,  but  noth 
ing  for  which  they  should  have  been  hanged ;  and  these  New  England  mag 
istrates  acted  like  the  ignorant  surgeon,  that  knew  no  way  of  curing  a  bad 
limb  but  by  cutting  it  off." 

My  venerated  friend,  that  illustrious  Quaker  philanthropist,  William  Allen, 
of  London,  in  the  doctrinal  and  historical  Summary  prefixed  to  his  edition  of 
Woolman's  Journal,  has  related  all  the  sufferings,  without  making  any  allusion 
to  the  offences,  of  either  the  Quakers  or  the  Ranters.  He  has  also  erroneously 
ascribed  the  first  tolerating  law  in  favor  of  the  Quakers  to  Massachusetts,  in 
stead  of  Connecticut. 


CHAP.  III.]         RESTORATION  OF  CHARLES  II.  313 

privilege  of  importing  commodities  into  England  free  from  the 
duties  which  all  other  importers  were  constrained  to  pay.  By 
the  favor  of  Cromwell,  too,  the  ordinances  by  which  the  Long 
Parliament  had  restricted  their  commerce  were  not  enforced  ; 
and  they  continued  to  trade  wherever  they  pleased.  Almost 
all  the  peculiar  circumstances,  which  thus  combined  to  promote 
the  prosperity  of  New  England  during  the  suspension  of  mon 
archy,  contributed  proportionally  to  overcast  the  prospects 
awakened  by  the  Restoration.  There  was  the  strongest  reason 
to  expect  an  abridgment  of  commercial  advantages,  and  to 
tremble  for  the  security  of  religious  and  political  freedom. 
Various  other  circumstances  conspired  to  retard  the  recogni 
tion  of  the  royal  authority  in  New  England.  On  the  death  of 
Cromwell,  the  colonists  were  successively  urged  to  recognize, 
first,  his  son  Richard  as  protector,  afterwards,  the  Long  Par 
liament,  which  for  a  short  time  resumed  its  ascendency,  and 
subsequently,  the  Committee  of  Safety,  as  the  legitimate  organs 
of  sovereign  power  in  England.  But,  doubtful  of  the  stability 
of  any  of  these  forms  of  government,  they  prudently  declined 
to  commit  themselves  by  positive  declaration.  In  the  month 
of  July  [1660],  a  vessel,  on  board  of  which  were  Generals 
Whalley  and  Goffe,  two  of  the  late  king's  judges,  arrived  with 
intelligence  of  the  restoration  of  Charles  the  Second  ;  but  no 
authoritative  or  official  communication  of  this  event  was  re 
ceived  ;  and  England  was  represented  as  being  in  a  very  un 
settled  and  distracted  condition.  Massachusetts  had  no  in 
ducement  to  imitate  Virginia  in  a  premature  declaration  for  the 
king  ;  and  while  farther  intelligence  was  anxiously  expected, 
Whalley  and  Gofie  were  permitted  to  travel  through  the  prov 
ince,  and  accept  the  friendly  civilities  which  many  persons 
tendered  to  them,  and  with  which  Charles  afterwards  bitterly 
reproached  the  colonists.1 

At  length,  authentic  tidings  were  obtained  that  the  royal 
authority  was  firmly  established  in  England  [December,  1660], 
and  that  complaints  against  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  had 
been  presented,  by  various  royalists,  Quakers,  and  other  ene 
mies  of  its  policy  or  institutions,  to  the  privy  council  and  the 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 
VOL.    I.  40 


314  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

houses  of  parliament.  The  General  Court  was  straightway 
convened,  and  an  address  voted  to  the  king,  in  which,  with 
considerable  ability,  and  with  that  conformity  which  they  stud 
ied  to  the  language  of  Scripture,  the  colonists  justified  their 
whole  conduct,  tendered  assurances  of  a  dutiful  attachment  to 
their  sovereign,  and  entreated  his  protection  and  favor,  which 
they  professed  to  expect  the  more  confidently  from  one,  who, 
having  been  himself  a  fugitive,  was  no  stranger  to  the  lot  and 
the  feelings  of  exiles.  Having  vindicated  their  proceedings 
against  the  Quakers,  by  an  exposition  of  the  heretical  doctrines 
that  were  introduced,  and  of  the  seditious  and  indecent  ex 
cesses  that  were  committed  by  these  sectaries,  they  expressed 
their  entire  readiness  and  earnest  desire  to  defend  themselves 
against  every  other  charge  that  already  had  been,  or  in  future 
might  be,  preferred  against  them.  "  Let  not  the  king  hear 
men's  words,"  they  said  ;  "your  servants  are  true  men,  fear 
ers  of  God  and  the  king,  and  not  given  to  change,  zealous  of 
government  and  order,  orthodox  and  peaceable  in  Israel.  We 
are  not  seditious  as  to  the  interest  of  Caesar,  nor  schismatics 
as  to  matters  of  religion.  We  distinguish  between  churches 
and  their  impurities  ;  between  a  living  man,  though  not  without 
sickness  and  infirmity,  and  no  man.  Irregularities  either  in 
ourselves  or  others  we  desire  may  be  amended.  We  could 
not  live  without  the  worship  of  God  ;  we  were  not  permitted 
the  use  of  public  worship,  without  such  a  yoke  of  subscription 
and  conformity  as  we  could  not  consent  unto  without  sin. 
That  we  might,  therefore,  enjoy  divine  worship  without  human 
mixtures,  without  offence  either  to  God,  or  man,  or  our  con 
sciences,  we,  with  leave,  but  not  without  tears,  departed  from 
our  country,  kindred,  and  fathers'  houses,  into  this  Patmos." 
They  assimilated  their  secession  from  England  to  that  of  "  the 
good  old  non-conformist  Jacob  "  from  Syria  ;  but  declared 
that  "  the  providential  exception  of  us  thereby  from  the  late 
wars  and  temptations  of  either  party  we  account  as  a  favor 
from  God."  They  solicited  the  king  to  protect  their  ecclesi 
astical  and  civil  institutions,  protesting  that  they  considered  the 
chief  value  of  the  latter  to  consist  in  their  subservience  to  the 
cultivation  and  enjoyment  of  religion. 

A  similar  address  was  made  to  parliament ;  and  letters  were 


CHAP.  III.]  GOFFE  AND  WHALLEY.  315 

written  to  Lord  Manchester,  Lord  Say  and  Seal,  and  other 
persons  of  distinction,  who  were  known  to  be  friends  of  the  col 
ony,  soliciting  their  interposition  in  its  behalf.  Leverett,  the 
agent  for  the  colony  at  London,  was  instructed,  at  the  same  time, 
to  use  every  effort  in  order  to  procure  a  continuance  of  the  ex 
emption  from  customs  which  the  colonists  had  hitherto  enjoyed. 
But  before  he  had  time  to  make  any  such  vain  attempt,  the  par 
liament  had  already  established  the  duties  of  tonnage  and  pound 
age  over  every  portion  of  the  empire.  This  disappointment  was 
softened  by  a  gracious  answer  which  was  returned  by  the  king 
to  the  provincial  address,  and  was  accompanied  by  an  order  for 
the  apprehension  of  Whalley  and  Goffe.  [1661.]  So  prompt 
a  display  of  good-will  and  confidence  excited  general  satisfac 
tion  ;  and  a  day  of  thanksgiving  was  appointed,  to  acknowledge 
the  favor  of  Heaven  in  moving  the  heart  of  the  king  to  incline 
to  the  desires  of  the  people.  With  regard  to  Whalley  and 
Goffe,  the  provincial  authorities  were  greatly  perplexed  be 
tween  the  obligation  of  a  duty  which  it  was  impossible  to 
decline,  and  their  reluctance  to  betray  to  a  horrible  fate  two 
men  who  had  lately  been  members  of  a  government  acknowl 
edged  and  obeyed  by  the  whole  British  empire,  who  had  fled 
to  New  England  as  an  inviolable  sanctuary  from  royal  ven 
geance,  and  were  recommended  to  the  kindness  of  the  colo 
nists  by  letters  from  the  most  eminent  ministers  of  the  Inde 
pendent  persuasion  in  the  parent  state.  It  is  generally  sup 
posed,  and  is  sufficiently  probable,  that  intimation  was  privately 
conveyed  to  the  fugitive  regicides  of  the  orders  that  had  been 
received  ;  and,  although  warrants  for  their  apprehension  were 
issued,  arid  by  the  industry  of  the  royalists  a  diligent  search 
for  their  persons  was  instituted,  they  were  enabled,  by  the 
assistance  of  their  friends,  by  dexterous  evasion  from  place 
to  place,  and  by  strict  seclusion,  to  end  their  days  in  New 
England.1 

1  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Small  as  was  the  number  of 
royalists  in  Massachusetts,  it  was  too  great  to  enable  the  people  to  afford  per 
manent  shelter  to  Goffe  and  Whalley.  But  in  New  Haven  there  were  no 
royalists  at  all ;  and  even  those  who  disapproved  of  the  great  action  of  the 
regicides  regarded  it  (with  more  of  admiration  than  abhorrence)  as  the  error 
of  noble  and  generous  minds.  Leet,  the  governor  of  New  Haven,  and  his 
council,  when  summoned  by  the  pursuers  of  Goffe  and  Whalley  to  assist  in 
the  apprehension  of  them,  first  consumed  abundance  of  time  in  deliberating 


316  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

But  the  apprehensions  which  the  colonists  had  originally 
entertained  of  danger  to  their  civil  and  ecclesiastical  institu 
tions  were  speedily  reawakened  by  intelligence  that  reached 
them  from  England  of  the  industrious  malignity  which  was 
exerted  in  circulating  the  most  unfavorable  representations  of 
their  conduct,  of  the  countenance  that  these  representations 
received  from  the  king,  and  of  the  vindictive  and  tyrannical 
designs  against  them  which  general  opinion  ascribed  to  the 
court.  It  was  reported  that  their  commercial  intercourse  with 
Virginia  and  the  West  India  Islands  was  to  be  cut  off ;  that 
three  frigates  were  preparing  to  sail  from  England,  in  order  to 
facilitate  the  introduction  of  arbitrary  power  ;  and  that  this 
armament  was  to  be  accompanied  by  a  governor- general, 
whose  jurisdiction  was  to  extend  over  all  the  North  American 
plantations.  Apprehensions  of  these  and  other  changes  at 
length  prevailed  so  strongly  in  Massachusetts,  as  to  produce  a 
public  measure  of  very  remarkable  character.  The  General 
Court,  having  proclaimed  the  necessity  of  promoting  unity  of 
spirit  and  purpose  among  the  colonists  for  the  vindication  of 
their  provincial  liberties,  in  consistence  with  a  dutiful  recog 
nition  of  the  paramount  authority  of  England,  appointed  a 
committee  of  eight  of  the  most  eminent  persons  in  the  State 
to  prepare  a  report,  ascertaining  the  extent  of  their  rights  and 
the  limits  of  their  obedience  ;  and  shortly  after  [May,  1661], 
the  Court,  in  conformity  with  the  report  of  the  committee, 
framed  and  published  a  series  of  declaratory  resolutions  ex 
pressive  of  their  solemn  and  deliberate  judgment  on  those 
important  subjects.  It  was  declared  that  the  patent  (under 
God)  is  the  original  compact  and  main  foundation  of  the 
provincial  commonwealth,  and  of  its  institutions  and  policy ; 
that  the  governor  and  company  are,  by  the  patent,  a  body 
politic  empowered  to  confer  the  rights  of  freemen  ;  and  that 
the  freemen  so  constituted  have  authority  to  elect  annually 
their  governor,  assistants,  representatives,  and  all  other  officers  ; 

on  the  extent  of  their  powers,  and  then  protested,  that,  in  a  matter  of  such 
importance,  they  could  not  act  without  the  orders  of  an  assembly.  The  royal 
ist  pursuers,  incensed  at  this  answer,  desired  the  governor  to  declare  at  once 
whether  he  owned  and  honored  the  king ;  to  which  he  replied, "  We  do  honor 
his  Majesty ;  but  we  have  tender  consciences,  and  wish  first  to  know  whether 
he  will  own  us."  —  Trumbull. 


CHAP.  III.]    MASSACHUSETTS  ASSERTS  HER  RIGHTS.        317 

that  the  magistracy,  thus  composed,  hath  all  requisite  power, 
both  legislative  and  executive,  for  the  government  of  all  the 
people,  whether  inhabitants  or  strangers,  without  appeal,  ex 
cept  against  laws  repugnant  to  those  of  England  ;  that  the 
provincial  government  is  entitled  by  every  means,  even  by 
force  of  arms,  to  defend  itself  both  by  land  and  sea  against 
all  persons  attempting  injury  to  the  province  or  its  inhabitants  ; 
and  that  any  imposition  injurious  to  the  provincial  community, 
and  contrary  to  its  just  laws,  would  be  an  infringement  of  the 
fundamental  rights  of  the  people  of  New  England.  This  firm 
and  distinct  assertion  of  provincial  rights  was  accompanied 
with  a  recognition  of  the  duties  to  which  the  people  were 
engaged  by  their  allegiance,  and  which,  it  was  declaratory 
announced,  consisted  in  preserving  the  colony  as  a  dependency 
of  the  English  crown,  and  preventing  its  subjection  to  any 
foreign  prince ;  in  defending,  to  the  utmost  of  their  power, 
the  king's  person  and  dominions  ;  and  in  maintaining  the  dig 
nity  and  prosperity  of  the  king  and  people,  by  punishing  crimes, 
and  by  propagating  the  gospel.1 

These  proceedings  disclose  without  disguise  or  ambiguity 
the  alarming  suspicions  which  the  colonists  entertained  of  the 
character  and  policy  of  their  new  sovereign,  and  the  firm  de 
termination  with  which  they  clung  to  the  dear-bought  rights  of 
which  they  anticipated  an  attempt  to  bereave  them.  How  far 
they  are  to  be  considered  as  indicating  a  settled  purpose  to 
resist  tyrannical  aggression  by  force  is  a  matter  of  uncertain 
conjecture.  It  is  not  improbable  that  the  authors  of  them 
hoped,  by  strongly  proclaiming  their  rights,  and  suggesting  the 
extremities  which  an  attempt  to  violate  them  would  legally 
warrant  and  might  eventually  provoke,  to  deter  the  king  from 
awakening,  in  the  commencement  of  his  reign,  the  recollection 
of  a  contest  which  had  proved  fatal  to  his  father,  —  and  which, 
if  once  rekindled,  even  to  an  extent  so  little  formidable  as  a 
controversy  with  an  infant  colony  implied,  might  soon  become 

1  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  During  the  subsistence  of  the  Commonwealth 
in  England,  John  Eliot,  the  missionary,  on  one  occasion,  so  far  overstepped 
his  proper  functions  as  to  publish  a  little  treatise  against  monarchical  govern 
ment.  The  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  now  deemed  it  expedient  to  cite 
him  before  them  to  answer  for  this  impugnation  of  regal  authority.  Eliot 
acknowledged  that  he  had  acted  rashly  and  culpably ;  and,  desiring  forgiveness, 
obtained  it. 


318  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

less  unequal,  by  presenting  an  occasion  of  revival  and  exercise 
to  passions  hardly  yet  extinguished  in  England.  If  such  were 
the  views  of  the  provincial  leaders,  the  soundness  of  them  was 
approved  by  the  event.  But,  in  the  mean  time,  the  provincial 
authorities,  in  order  to  manifest  a  dutiful  subordination  to  the 
parent  state,  issued  injunctions  for  the  pursuit  and  apprehension 
of  GofFe  and  Whalley,  and  publicly  announced  that  no  persons 
obnoxious  to  the  laws  of  England,  and  flying  from  her  tribu 
nals,  would  receive  shelter  in  a  colony  that  acknowledged  her 
supreme  authority. 

Having  now  declared  the  terms  on  which  they  recognized 
the  dominion  of  the  English  crown,  the  General  Court  caused 
the  king  to  be  solemnly  proclaimed  as  their  undoubted  prince 
and  sovereign  lord.  They  published,  at  the  same  time,  an 
ordinance  prohibiting  all  disorderly  behaviour  on  the  occasion, 
and  commanding  in  particular  that  none  should  presume  to 
drink  his  Majesty's  health,  "  which,"  it  was  added,  "  he  hath, 
in  an  especial  manner,  forbidden,"  —  an  injunction  the  most 
alien  to  the  sentiments  and  habits  of  the  king,  and  imputed  to 
him  on  no  better  grounds  than  that  drinking  of  healths  was 
prohibited  by  the  statutes  of  his  colony  of  Massachusetts. 
This  senseless  practice  had  been  offensive,  on  account  of  its 
heathen  origin,  to  the  more  scrupulous  of  the  Puritan  planters, 
who  were  desirous  in  all  things  to  study  a  literal  and  exclusive 
conformity  to  the  revealed  will  of  God,  —  and,  accounting 
nothing  unworthy  of  human  regard  that  afforded  occasion  to 
exercise  such  conformity,  finally  prevailed  to  have  the  cere 
monial  of  drinking  healths  interdicted  by  law.  Though  many 
of  the  colonists  entertained  little  favor  or  respect  for  this  reg 
ulation,  yet  almost  all  of  them  were  desirous  that  the  restora 
tion  of  royal  authority  should  not  be  signalized  by  a  triumph 
over  any,  even  the  least  important,  of  the  provincial  constitu 
tions.  Intelligence  having  arrived  soon  after  of  the  progress 
of  the  complaints  that  were  continually  exhibited  to  the  privy 
council  against  the  colony,  and  an  order  at  the  same  time  being 
received  from  the  king  that  deputies  should  be  sent  forthwith 
to  England  to  make  answer  to  those  complaints,  the  Court 
committed  this  important  duty  to  Simon  Bradstreet,  one  of  the 
magistrates,  and  John  Norton,  one  of  the  ministers  of  Boston. 


CHAP.  III.]     ROYAL  LETTER  TO  MASSACHUSETTS.  319 

[December,  1661.]  These  agents  were  instructed  to  vindicate 
the  loyalty  and  justify  the  conduct  of  the  colony  ;  to  discover, 
if  possible,  what  were  the  designs  which  the  king  meditated, 
or  the  apprehensions  that  he  entertained  ;  and  neither  to  do 
nor  submit  to  any  thing  prejudicial  to  the  provincial  charter. 
They  undertook  their  thankless  office  with  great  reluctance, 
and  obtained  before  their  departure  a  public  assurance  of  being 
indemnified  by  the  General  Court  for  whatever  damage  they 
might  sustain  by  detention  of  their  persons  or  other  maltreat 
ment  in  England.1 

Whether  from  the  vigor  and  resolution  which  the  recent 
conduct  of  the  provincial  government  displayed,  or  from  the 
moderation  of  the  wise  counsellors  by  whom  Charles  was  then 
surrounded,  promoted  by  the  influence  which  Lord  Say  and 
some  other  eminent  persons  employed  in  behalf  of  the  colony, 
the  agents  were  received  with  unexpected  favor,  and  were  soon 
enabled  to  return  to  Boston  [1662]  with  a  letter  from  the 
king,  confirming  the  provincial  charter,  and  promising  to  renew 
it  under  the  great  seal,  whenever  this  formality  should  be  de 
sired.  The  royal  letter  likewise  announced  an  amnesty  for 
whatever  treasons  had  been  committed  during  the  late  troubles, 
to  all  persons  but  those  who  were  attainted  by  act  of  parlia 
ment,  and  who  had  fled,  or  might  hereafter  fly,  to  New  Eng 
land.  But  it  contained  other  matters  by  no  means  acceptable 
to  the  colonists.  It  required  that  the  General  Court  should 
pronounce  all  the  ordinances  that  had  been  enacted  during  the 
abeyance  of  royalty  invalid,  and  forthwith  revise  them  and 
repeal  every  one  that  might  seem  repugnant  to  the  royal  au 
thority  ;  that  the  oath  of  allegiance  should  be  duly  administered 
to  every  person ;  that  justice  should  be  distributed  in  the 
king's  name  ;  that  all  who  desired  it  should  be  permitted  to  use 
the  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  and  to  perform  their  devotions 
according  to  the  ceremonial  of  the  church  of  England  ;  that, 
in  the  choice  of  the  governor  and  assistants,  or  counsellors,  of 
the  colony,  the  only  qualifications  to  be  regarded  should  be 
wisdom  and  integrity,  without  any  reference  to  peculiarities  of 
religious  faith  ;  and  that  all  freeholders  of  competent  estates, 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

and  not  immoral  in  their  lives,  should  be  admitted  to  vote  in 
the  election  of  officers,  civil  and  military,  whatever  might  be 
their  opinions  with  respect  to  forms  of  church-government. 
"We  cannot  be  understood,"  it  was  added,  "hereby  to  direct 
or  wish  that  any  indulgence  should  be  granted  to  Quakers, 
whose  principles  being  inconsistent  with  any  kind  of  govern 
ment,  we  have  found  it  necessary,  with  the  advice  of  our  par 
liament  here,  to  make  a  sharp  law  against  them,  and  are  well 
content  you  do  the  like  there."1 

However  reasonable  some  of  the  foregoing  requisitions  may 
now  appear,  the  greater  number  of  them  were  highly  disagree 
able  to  the  persons  to  whom  they  were  addressed.  The  colo 
nists  considered  themselves  entitled  to  maintain  the  form  of  pol 
ity  in  church  and  state,  which  they  had  fled  to  a  desert  in  order 
to  cultivate,  without  the  intrusion  and  commixture  of  different 
principles  ;  and  they  regarded  with  the  utmost  jealousy  the  pre 
cedent  of  an  interference  with  their  fundamental  constitutions  by 
a  prince,  who,  they  were  firmly  persuaded,  was  aiming  at  present 
to  enfeeble  the  system  which  he  waited  only  a  more  convenient 
season  to  destroy.  To  comply  with  the  royal  injunctions, 
they  apprehended,  would  be  to  introduce  among  their  children 
the  spectacles  and  corruptions  which  they  had  incurred  the 
mightiest  sacrifices  in  order  to  withdraw  from, their  eyes  ;  and 
to  throw  open  every  office  in  the  state  to  Roman  Catholics, 
Socinians,  and  every  heretic  and  unbeliever  who  might  think 
power  worth  the  purchase  of  a  general  declaration  that  he  was 
(according  to  his  own  unexamined  interpretation  of  the  term) 
a  Christian.  The  king,  never  deserving,  was  never  able  to 
obtain,  credit  with  his  subjects  for  good  faith  or  moderation  ; 
he  was  from  the  beginning  of  his  reign  suspected  of  a  pre 
dilection  for  the  church  of  Rome  ;  and  the  various  efforts 
which  he  made  to  procure  a  relaxation  of  the  penal  laws 
against  the  Protestant  dissenters  in  England  were  jealously 
and  censoriously  regarded  by  all  these  dissenters  themselves, 
—  with  the  solitary  exception  of  the  Quakers,  who  considered 

1  Hutchinson.  Belknap.  The  royal  invitation  to  persecute  the  Quakers 
was  disregarded  by  the  government  of  Massachusetts.  Whether  from  greater 
deference  to  the  king's  pleasure  or  from  some  other  cause,  the  government  of 
Rhode  Island,  in  the  year  1665,  passed  an  act  of  outlawry  against  the  Quakers 
for  refusing  to  bear  arms.  —  Collections  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society. 


CHAP.  III.]  UNPOPULARITY  OF  THE  COLONIAL  AGENTS.  321 

the  other  Protestants  and  the  Catholics  as  nearly  on  a  level 
with  each  other,  and  were  made  completely  the  dupes  of  the 
artifices  by  which  Charles  and  his  successor  endeavoured  to 
introduce  the  ascendency  of  the  Catholic  church  under  the 
preliminary  guise  of  universal  toleration. 

Of  all  the  requisitions  in  the  royal  letter,  the  only  one  that 
was  complied  with  was  that  which  directed  that  judicial  pro 
ceedings  should  be  conducted  in  the  king's  name.     The  letter 
commanded  that  its  contents  should  be  published  in  the  colony  ; 
which  was  accordingly  done,  —  with  an  intimation,  however, 
that  the  directions  relative  to  political  and  ecclesiastical  matters 
were  reserved  for  the  deliberate  consideration  which  would  be 
requisite   to   adjust  them  to   the  existing  constitutions.      The 
treatment  which  the  provincial  agents  experienced  from  their 
countrymen,  it  is   painful,  but  necessary,  to .  relate.     The  ill- 
humor  which  some  of  the  requisitions  provoked  was  unjustly 
extended  to  these  men  ;  and  their  merits,  though  at  first  grate 
fully  acknowledged,  were  speedily  forgotten.     Impressed  with 
the  danger  from  which  the  colony  had  obtained  a  present  de 
liverance,  but  which   still   impended  over  it  from   the   designs 
of  a  prince  wrho  visibly  abetted  every  complaint  of  its  enemies, 
the  agents  increased  their  unpopularity  by  warmly  urging  that 
all  the   requisitions   should   be   instantly  and   literally   obeyed. 
Norton,  who,  on  the  first  inofficial  intelligence  that  was  received 
of  the  king's   restoration,  had   ineffectually  counselled   his  fel 
low-citizens  to  proclaim  the  royal  authority,  —  in  now  again 
pressing  upon  them  a  measure  to  which  they  were  still  more 
averse,  went  the  length  of  declaring  to  the  General  Court,  that, 
if  they  complied  not  with  the  terms  of  the  king's  letter,  they 
must  blame  themselves  for   the  bloodshed  that  would  ensue. 
Such  language  was  ill  calculated  to  soothe  the  popular  disquiet, 
or  recommend  an  ungracious  counsel ;  and  the  deputies,  who 
were  actuated   by  the  most  disinterested   zeal  to  serve  rather 
than  flatter  their  fellow-citizens,  now  found  themselves  oppro- 
briously  identified  with  the  grievances  of  the  colony,  and  heard 
the  evils,  which  it  was  not  in  their  power  to  prevent,  ascribed 
to  their  neglect  or  unguarded  concession.     Bradstreet,  endow 
ed  with  a  robust,  philosophical  temper,  was  the  less  moved  by 
this  ingratitude,  and  entertained  his  evil  fortune  without  surprise 
VOL.   i.  41 


322  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

or  repining  ;  but  Norton,  who  was  a  man  of  keen  and  delicate 
sensibility,  could  not  behold  the  altered  eyes  of  his  country 
men  without  the  most  stinging  sensations  of  grief  and  mortifi 
cation.  When  he  heard  many  say  of  him,  that  "  he  had  laid 
the  foundation  for  the  ruin  of  his  country's  liberty,"  he  ex 
pressed  no  resentment,  but  sunk  into  a  profound  and  consuming 
melancholy.  Vainly  struggling  with  his  anguish,  and  endeav 
ouring  to  embrace  his  lot  with  patience  and  do  his  duty  to  the 
last,  he  died  soon  after  of  a  broken  heart.  His  death  was  re 
garded  by  the  people  as  a  public  misfortune,  and  felt  as  a  poig 
nant  reproach  ;  and  the  universal  mourning  that  overspread  the 
province  expressed  a  late  but  lasting  remembrance  of  his  vir 
tue,  and  bewailed  an  ungrateful  error  which  only  repentance 
was  now  permitted  to  repair.1 

The  colony  of  Rhode  Island  received  the  tidings  of  the 
restoration  of  royalty  with  much  real  or  apparent  satisfaction. 
It  was  hoped  by  the  inhabitants  that  the  suspension  of  their 
charter  by  the  Long  Parliament  would  more  than  compensate 
the  demerit  of  having  accepted  a  charter  from  such  authority  ; 
and  that  their  exclusion  from  the  confederacy,  of  which  Mas 
sachusetts  was  the  head,  would  operate  as  an  additional  recom 
mendation  to  royal  favor.  The  restored  monarchical  govern 
ment  was  proclaimed  with  eager  haste  in  this  colony ;  and  Dr. 
John  Clarke  was  employed  as  deputy  from  the  colonists  to 
carry  their  dutiful  respects  to  the  foot  of  the  throne,  and  to 
solicit  a  new  charter  in  their  favor.  The  envoy  conducted  his 
negotiation  with  a  suppleness  of  adroit  servility  that  rendered 
the  success  of  it  dearly  bought.  He  not  only  vaunted  in  court 
ly  strains  the  loyalty  of  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island,  of 
which  not  the  slightest  proof  could  be  adduced,  but,  meeting 
this  year  the  deputies  of  Massachusetts  at  court,  he  publicly 
challenged  them  to  cite  any  one  demonstration  of  duty  or  loy 
alty  by  their  constituents  to  the  present  king  or  his  father, 
from  the  period  of  their  first  establishment  in  New  England.2 

1  Mather.     Hutchinson.     See  Note  X.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

2  Mr.    Bancroft   has,   with   strange   lack   of  courtesy    and   correctness,   re 
proached  me  with  having  invented  the  charge  I  have  preferred  against  Clarke. 
I  am  incapable  of  such  dishonesty  ;  and  sincerely  hope  that  Mr.  Bancroft's  re 
proach  is,  and  will  continue,  on  his  part,  a  solitary  instance  of  deviation  from 
candor  and  rectitude. 

With  a  mixture  of  pain  and  admiration,  I  have  witnessed  the  displeasure 


CHAP.  III.]  RHODE  ISLAND  CHARTER.  323 

Yet  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island  had  solicited  and  accepted 
a  patent  from  the  Long  Parliament  in  the  commencement  of 
its  struggle  with  Charles  the  First  ;  while  Massachusetts  de 
clined  to  make  a  similar  recognition,  even  when  the  Parliament 
was  at  the  utmost  height  of  its  power  and  success.1  Clarke, 
succeeded  in  obtaining,  this  year  [1662]  ,2  a  charter  which  as 
sured  to  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island  and  Providence  the 
amplest  enjoyment  of  religious  liberty  and  most  unlimited  con 
cession  of  municipal  jurisdiction.  Certain  of  the  leading  colo 
nists,  together  with  all  other  persons  who  should  in  future  be 
admitted  freemen  of  the  society,  were  incorporated  by  the  title 
of  the  Governor  and  Company  of  the  English  Colony  of  Rhode 
Island  and  Providence.  The  supreme  or  legislative  power  was 
vested  in  an  assembly,  consisting  of  the  governor,  assistants, 
and  representatives  elected  from  their  own  number  by  the  free 
men.  This  assembly  was  empowered  to  enact  legal  ordinances, 
and  establish  forms  of  government  and  magistracy,  with  as 
much  conformity  to  the  laws  and  institutions  of  England  as 
the  state  of  the  country  and  condition  of  the  people  would  ad 
mit  ;  to  erect  courts  of  justice  ;  to  regulate  the  manner  of  ap 
pointment  to  places  of  trust  ;  to  inflict  all  lawful  punishments  ; 
and  to  exercise  the  prerogative  of  pardon.  A  governor,  depu 
ty-governor,  and  ten  assistants  were  to  be  annually  chosen  by 
the  assembly  ;  and  the  first  board  of  these  officers,  nominated 
by  the  charter,  on  the  suggestion  of  the  provincial  agent,  were 
authorized  to  commence  the  work  of  carrying  its  provisions 
into  execution.  The  governor  and  company  were  empowered 
to  transport  all  merchandise  not  prohibited  by  the  statutes  of 
the  kingdom,  on  payment  of  the  usual  duties  ;  to  exercise 
martial  law,  when  necessary  ;  and,  upon  just  causes,  to  invade 

with  which  some  of  the  literati  of  Rhode  Island  have  received  my  strictures 
on  Clarke.  The  authorities  they  have  cited  prove  undeniably  that  he  was  a 
true  patriot  and  excellent  man,  and  well  deserving  the  reverence  of  his  natural 
and  national  posterity.  But  every  person  acquainted  with  history  and  human 
nature  ought  to  know  how  apt  even  good  men  are  to  be  transported  beyond 
the  line  of  honor  and  integrity,  in  conducting  such  negotiations  as  that  which 
was  confided  to  Clarke. 

1  The  Rhode-Islanders  had  also  presented  an  address  to  the  rulers  of  Eng 
land  in  1659,  beseeching  favor  to  themselves,  as  "  a  poor  colony,  an  outcast 
people,  formerly  from  our  mother  nation  in  the  bishops'  days,  and  since  from 
the  New-English  over-zealous  colonies."  —  Douglass  s  Summary. 

2  Although  the  charter  was  framed  in  1662,  yet,  in  consequence  of  a  dispute 
between  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island,  it  was  not  -completed  till  July,  1663. 


324  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

and  destroy  the  native  Indians  or  other  enemies.  The  terri 
tory  granted  to  the  governor  and  company  and  their  succes 
sors  was  described  as  that  part  of  the  dominions  of  the  Brit 
ish  crown  in  New  England,  which  embraced  the  islands  in 
Narraganset  Bay  and  the  countries  and  districts  adjacent,  — 
which  were  appointed  to  be  holden  of  the  manbr  of  East 
Greenwich  in  common  soccage.  The  inhabitants  and  their 
children  were  declared  to  be  entitled  to  the  same  immunities 
which  would  have  accrued  to  them,  if  they  had  resided  or  been 
born  within  the  realm.  This  is  the  first  instance  of  the  crea 
tion,  by  a  British  patent,  of  an  authority  of  that  peculiar  de 
scription  which  was  then  established  in  Rhode  Island.  Cor 
porations  had  been  formerly  constituted  within  the  realm,  for 
the  government  of  colonial  plantations  ;  but  now  a  body  politic 
was  created  with  specific  powers  for  administering  all  the  af 
fairs  of  a  colony  within  the  colonial  territory  itself.  The  char 
ter  was  received  with  great  satisfaction  by  the  colonists,  who 
entered  immediately  into  possession  of  the  democratical  con 
stitution  which  it  appointed  for  them,  and  continued  to  pursue 
the  same  system  of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  policy  that  they  had 
heretofore  observed.1 

Though  the  inhabitants  of  Connecticut  neither  felt  nor  af 
fected  the  same  .joy  that  Rhode  Island  expressed  at  the  resto 
ration  of  the  king,  they  did  not  fail  to  send  a  deputy  to  Eng 
land  to  express  their  recognition  of  the  royal  authority  and  to 
solicit  a  new  charter.2  They  were  fortunate  in  the  choice  of 
the  man  to  whom  they  committed  this  important  duty,  —  John 

1  Chalmers.     Hazard. 

8  At  New  Haven  the  republican  spirit  was  so  strong,  that  several  of  the 
principal  inhabitants  declined  to  act  as  magistrates  under  the  king.  Trumbull. 
It  was  here  that  Goffe  and  Whalley  found  the  securest  asylum,  and  ended  their 
days.  When  a  party  of  royal  officers  were  coming  in  pursuit  of  them  to 
New  Haven,  Davenport,  the  minister  of  the  place,  preached  publicly  in  favor 
of  the  regicides,  from  the  text  (Isaiah  xvi.,  3,  4),  "  Take  counsel,  execute 
judgment ;  make  thy  shadow  as  the  night  in  the  midst  of  the  noonday  ;  hide 
the  outcasts  ;  bewray  not  him  that  wandereth.  Let  mine  outcasts  dwell  with 
thee,  Moab  ;  be  thou  a  covert  to  them  from  the  face  of  the  spoiler."  Holmes. 
It  is  remarkable  that  Salem  and  New  Haven,  so  highly  distinguished  among 
the  towns  of  New  England  by  the  Puritan  and  republican  zeal  of  their  found 
ers,  have  so  long  continued  to  be  graced  by  the  superior  piety,  morality,  in 
dustry,  and  prosperity  of  their  inhabitants.  Dwight's  description  of  New 
Haven,  in  the  commencement  of  the  nineteenth  century,  is  one  of  the  most 
animating  and  agreeable  pictures  that  were  ever  delineated  of  a  social  congre 
gation  of  mankind.  Dwight's  Travels. 


CHAP.   III.]  CONNECTICUT   CHARTER.  325 

Winthrop,  the  son  of  the  eminent  person  of  the  same  name 
who  had  presided  with  so  much  honor  and  virtue  over  the 
province  of  Massachusetts.  Winthrop,  deriving  a  hereditary 
claim  on  the  kindness  of  the  king  from  a  friendship  that  had 
subsisted  between  his  own  grandfather  and  Charles  the  First,1 
employed  it  so  successfully,  as  to  obtain  for  his  constituents  a 
charter  in  almost  every  respect  the  same  with  that  which  was 
granted  to  Rhode  Island.  The  most  considerable  differences 
were,  that  by  the  Connecticut  charter  the  governor  was  direct 
ed  to  administer  the  oaths  of  allegiance  and  supremacy  to  the 
inhabitants,  —  a  formality  which  was  not  required  by  the  char 
ter  of  Rhode  Island,  where  many  of  the  people  scrupled  to 
take  an  oath  ;  and  that  by  the  last-mentioned  charter  liberty 
of  conscience  was  expressly  conceded  in  its  fullest  extent, 
while  the  other  made  no  express  mention  of  the  concerns  of 
religion,  and  no  other  allusion  to  them  than  what  might  seem 
to  be  implied  in  the  requisition  of  the  oath  of  supremacy. 
By  this  charter  New  Haven  was  united  with  Connecti 
cut  ;  an  arrangement  which  for  some  time  did  not  obtain 
the  unanimous  approbation  of  the  people  of  New  Haven,  al 
though  they  afterwards  heartily  acquiesced  in  it  ;  and  the  de 
scription  of  the  provincial  territory  was  indefinite  and  incorrect. 
But  on  the  whole  it  gave  so  much  satisfaction,  that  Winthrop, 
on  his  return,  was  received  with  grateful  approbation  by  his 
fellow-citizens,  and  annually  chosen  governor  of  the  united 
colony  as  long  as  he  lived.2 

There  was  thus  established  by  royal  charter,  both  in  Con 
necticut  and  Rhode  Island,  a  model  of  government  the  most 
perfectly  democratic,  together  with  the  additional  singularity 
of  subordinate  political  corporations  almost  wholly  disconnect 
ed  by  any  efficient  tie  or  relation  with  the  organ  of  sovereign 
authority.  All  power,  as  well  deliberative  as  active,  was 
vested  in  the  freemen  of  the  corporation  or  their  delegates  ; 

1  Mather  relates,  that,  when  Winthrop  presented  the  king  with  a  ring  which 
Charles  the  First  had  given  to  his  grandfather,  "  the  king  not  only  accepted 
his  present,  but  also  declared  that  he  accounted  it  one  of  his  richest  jewels  ; 
which,  indeed,  was  the  opinion  that  New  England  had  of  the  hand  that  carried 
it."     Yet  Charles  had,  little  more  than  a  year  before,  consigned  to  a  horrid 
death  Hugh  Peters,  the  father-in-law  of  Winthrop.     See  Note  XL,  at  the  end 
of  the  volume. 

2  Mather.     Chalmers.     Hazard. 


326  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

and  the  supreme  executive  magistrate  of  the  empire  was  ex 
cluded  from  every  constitutional  means  of  interposition  or  con 
trol.  A  conformity  to  the  laws  of  England,  no  doubt,  was 
enjoined  on  the  provincial  legislatures  ;  and  this  conformity 
was  conditioned  as  the  tenure  by  which  their  privileges  were 
enjoyed  ;  but  no  method  of  ascertaining  or  enforcing  its  ob 
servance  was  provided.  At  a  later  period,  the  crown  lawyers 
of  England  were  sensible  of  the  oversight  which  their  prede 
cessors  had  committed  ;  and  proposed  that  an  act  of  parlia 
ment  should  be  obtained,  requiring  those  colonies  to  transmit 
the  records  of  their  domestic  ordinances  to  Britain  for  the  in 
spection  and  consideration  of  the  king.  But  this  suggestion 
was  never  carried  into  effect.1 

1  Chalmers.  "  The  charters  of  Rhode  Island  and  Connecticut  were  care 
lessly  given  by  a  very  careless  monarch."  Macpherson's  Annals  of  Com 
merce. 


CHAP.  IV.]  COMMON  INTERESTS  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.   327 


CHAPTER    IV. 

Emigration  of  ejected  Ministers  to  New  England.  —  Royal  Commissioners 
sent  thither.  —  Petition  of  the  Assembly  of  Massachusetts  to  the  King  — » 
rejected.  —  Policy  pursued  by  the  Commissioners.  —  Their  Disputes  with 
the  Government  of  Massachusetts  —  and  Return  to  England.  —  Policy  of 
the  Colonists  to  conciliate  the  King  —  Effects  of  it.  —  Cession  of  Acadia  to 
the  French.  —  Prosperous  State  of  New  England.  —  Conspiracy  of  the  In 
dians.  —  Philip's  War.  —  The  King  resumes  his  Designs  against  Massa 
chusetts.  —  Controversy  respecting  the  Right  to  Maine  and  New  Hamp 
shire.  —  Progress  of  the  Dispute  between  the  King  and  the  Colony.  — 
State  of  Parties  in  Massachusetts.  —  State  of  Religion  and  Morals  in  New 
England.  —  Surrender  of  the  Charter  of  Massachusetts  demanded  by  the 
King  —  refused  by  the  Colonists.  —  Writ  of  Q,uo  Warranto  issued  against 
the  Colony.  —  Firmness  of  the  People.  —  Their  Charter  adjudged  to  be 
forfeited. 

ALTHOUGH  New  England  now  [1663]  consisted  of  a  varie 
ty  of  distinct  social  communities  independent  of  each  other, 
yet  a  common  and  harmonious  policy  was  naturally  engendered 
in  societies  founded  by  men  acknowledging  the  same  national 
origin,  conducted  to  America  by  the  same  motives,  and  as 
similated  by  religious  tenets,  manners,  laws,  and  municipal  in 
stitutions.  The  commercial  system  which  the  English  parlia 
ment  thought  fit  to  pursue  tended  still  farther  to  unite  these 
colonies  by  identity  of  views,  interests,  and  purposes.  The 
Navigation  Acts  which  it  framed,  and  which  we  have  considered 
at  much  length  in  the  history  of  Virginia,  created  for  a  time 
more  discontent  than  inconvenience,  and  served  rather  to  pro 
claim  than  to  enforce  the  restrictions  designed  to  be  imposed 
on  the  colonial  commerce.  These  restrictions  were  a  copious 
and  continual  source  of  displeasure  and  controversy  between 
the  two  countries.  The  colonies  had  been  accustomed  in  their 
infancy  to  a  free  trade  ;  and  its  surrender  was  required  with 
the  more  injustice,  and  yielded  with  the  greater  reluctance,  be 
cause  England  was  not  then  a  mart  in  which  all  the  produce 
of  the  colonies  could  be  vended,  or  from  which  all  the  wants 
of  their  inhabitants  could  be  supplied.  Even  in  the  southern 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

colonies,  where  the  governors  were  appointed  either  by  the 
crown  or  by  proprietaries  closely  connected  with  the  parent 
state,  the  Act  of  Navigation  was  very  imperfectly  executed  ;  and 
in  New  England,  where  the  governors  were  elected  by  the 
people,  it  appears,  for  a  considerable  time,  to  have  been  en 
tirely  disobeyed.1 

While  the  commercial  system  of  the  English  parliament  thus 
«tended  to  unite  the  colonies  by  community  of  interest  and  op 
position  to  the  parent  state,  the  ecclesiastical  policy  which  now 
prevailed  in  England  was  calculated  to  promote  among  the 
colonists  the  remembrance  of  the  original  causes  of  secession 
from  her  territory,  and  at  once  to  revive  their  influence,  and 
recommend  the  exercise  of  toleration  by  sympathy  with  the 
victims  of  an  opposite  principle.  Charles  the  Second  had  ob 
tained  the  assistance  of  the  English  Presbyterians  to  his  resto 
ration  by  express  and  solemn  promise  of  an  ecclesiastical  con 
stitution  framed  on  a  compromise  between  Episcopalian  and 
Presbyterian  principles  ;  but  by  the  advice,  or  at  least  with 
the  cordial  approbation,  of  Lord  Clarendon,  he  scrupled  not  to 
violate  this  engagement  as  soon  as  he  found  himself  securely 
established  on  the  throne.  In  consequence  of  the  rigorous 
execution  of  that  shameless  act  of  perfidy,  the  statute  of  uni 
formity,  in  the  close  of  the  preceding  year,  about  two  thousand 
of  the  English  clergy,  the  most  eminent  of  their  order  for 
learning,  virtue,  and  piety,  were  ejected  from  the  established 
church,  and,  to  the  astonishment  of  the  prevailing  party,  sacri 
ficed  temporal  interest  to  the  dictates  of  conscience.  They 
were  afterwards  banished  to  the  distance  of  five  miles  from 
every  corporation  in  England  ;  and  many  of  them  died  in 
prison  for  privately  exercising  their  ministry  in  contravention 
of  the  law.  While  the  majority  of  them  remained  in  Britain,  to 
preserve  by  their  instructions  the  decaying  piety  of  their  native 
land,  a  considerable  number  were  conducted  to  New  England, 
there  to  invigorate  American  virtue  by  a  fresh  example  of 
conscientious  sacrifice,  and  to  form  a  living  and  touching; 
memorial  of  the  cruelty  and  injustice  of  religious  intolerance. 
The  merits  and  the  sufferings  of  these  men  strongly  excited 

1  Chalmers. 


CHAP.  IV.]    APPREHENSIONS  OF  ROYAL  DISPLEASURE.      329 

the  admiration  and  sympathy  of  the  people  of  New  England  ; 
and  this  year  an  invitation  was  despatched  to  Dr.  John  Owen, 
one  of  the  most  eminent  scholars  and  theologians  that  the 
world  has  ever  produced,  to  accept  an  ecclesiastical  ap 
pointment  in  Massachusetts.  Owen  declined  to  avail  himself 
of  this  invitation,  on  account  of  the  cloud  of  royal  displeasure 
which  he  perceived  to  be  gathering  against  Massachusetts,  and 
the  measures  which  he  had  reason  to  believe  would  ere  long, 
be  adopted  for  the  subjugation  of  its  civil  and  religious  liber 
ties.  Other  countries  besides  America  contended  for  the 
honor  of  sheltering  this  illustrious  man  from  the  persecution  of 
the  church  of  England,  and  for  the  happiness  and  advantage 
expected  from  his  presence,  example,  and  counsels  ;  for  his 
character  was  equal  to  his  genius  and  learning.  But  he  pre 
ferred  suffering  in  a  land  of  which  he  fully  understood  the  lan 
guage,  to  enjoyment  and  honor  among  a  people  with  whom  his 
communication  must  necessarily  have  been  more  restricted. 
At  a  later  period,  when  the  presidency  of  Harvard  College 
was  offered  to  him,  he  consented  to  embrace  this  sphere  of 
useful  and  important  duty ;  and  having  shipped  his  effects  for 
New  England,  was  preparing  to  accompany  them,  when  his 
steps  were  arrested  by  an  order  from  Charles,  expressly  com 
manding  him  not  to  depart  from  the  kingdom.1 

The  apprehension  which  the  inhabitants  of  Massachusetts 
had  entertained,  ever  since  the  Restoration,  of  hostile  designs 
of  the  English  government,  and  which  had  been  confirmed  by 
the  reasons  assigned  by  Dr.  Owen  for  refusing  the  first  invita 
tion  they  tendered  to  him,  was  strengthened  by  all  the  other 
intelligence  they  obtained  from  England.  A  great  number  of 
the  ejected  Non-conformist  ministers  who  had  made  prepara 
tion  for  emigrating  to  Massachusetts  now  declined  to  settle  in 
a  country  on  which  the  extreme  of  royal  vengeance  was  ex 
pected  to  descend  ;  and  at  length  the  most  positive  information 
was  received,  that  Charles  had  openly  avowed,  that,  although 
he  was  willing  to  preserve  the  provincial  charter,  he  was  never 
theless  determined  to  institute  an  inquiry  for  the  purpose  of 
ascertaining  how  far  the  provisions  of  this  charter  had  been 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson. 

VOL.   i.  42 


HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

practically  observed.  It  was  reported  soon  after,  that  the 
king  had  associated  this  object  with  the  design  which  he  cher 
ished  of  provoking  a  quarrel  with  Holland  ;  and  that  for  this 
double  purpose  he  was  preparing  to  despatch  an  expedition  for 
the  reduction  of  the  Dutch  settlement  of  New  York,  and 
meant  to  send  along  with  it  a  board  of  commissioners  empow 
ered  to  investigate  and  judge  (according  to  their  own  discre 
tion)  all  complaints  and  disputes  that  might  exist  within  New 
England,  and  to  take  every  step  they  might  judge  necessary 
for  settling  the  peace  and  security  of  the  country  on  a  solid 
foundation.  In  effect,  a  commission  for  these  purposes,  as 
well  as  for  the  reduction  of  New  York,  had  already  been  is 
sued  by  the  king  to  Sir  Robert  Carr,  Colonel  Nichols,  George 
Cartwright,  and  Samuel  Maverick.  This  measure,  conspiring 
with  the  reports  that  had  long  prevailed  of  the  projects  har 
boured  by  the  court  of  England  against  the  liberties  of  the 
colonists,  was  calculated  to  strike  them  with  dismay.  They 
knew  that  plausible  pretexts  were  not  wanting  to  justify  a 
censorious  view  of  certain  parts  of  their  conduct ;  and  they 
were  firmly  persuaded  that  the  dislike  and  suspicion  with  which 
the  king  regarded  them  would  never  be  satisfied  by  any  meas 
ure  short  of  the  entire  abrogation  of  their  institutions. 

Various  controversies  had  arisen  between  the  different  set 
tlements,  concerning  the  boundaries  of  their  respective  terri 
tories  ;  and  loud  complaints  were  preferred  by  the  representa 
tives  of  Mason,  and  by  Gorges,  and  other  members  of  the  old 
Council  of  Plymouth,  of  the  occupation  of  districts  and  the 
exercise  of  jurisdiction  to  which  these  complainers  pretended 
a  preferable  right.  The  claim  of  Mason  to  New  Hampshire, 
derived  from  the  assignment  of  the  Plymouth  Council,  had 
never  been  expressly  surrendered  ;  and  Gorges's  title  to  Maine 
was  confirmed  and  enlarged  by  a  grant  from  the  late  king,  in 
the  year  1639.  As  Gorges  adhered  to  the  royal  cause  in  the 
civil  wars,  the  death  of  the  king  produced  the  temporary 
demise  of  his  patent ;  both  he  and  Mason's  heirs  had  long 
abandoned  their  projects,  in  despair  of  ever  prosecuting  them 
to  a  successful  issue.  But  now  the  restoration  of  royalty  in 
England  presented  them  with  an  opportunity  of  vindicating 
their  claims  ;  and  the  congregation  of  inhabitants  in  the  terri- 


CHAP.  IV.]    COMMISSIONERS  SENT  TO  NEW  ENGLAND.     331 

tories  promised  advantage  from  such  vindication.  They  had 
as  yet  reaped  no  benefit  from  the  money  expended  on  their 
acquisitions  ;  but  they  now  embraced  the  prospect,  and  claimed 
the  right  of  the  labors  of  others,  who,  in  ignorance  of  their 
pretensions,  had  occupied  and  colonized  a  vacant  soil,  and  held 
it  by  the  right  of  purchase  from  its  native  proprietors.  In 
addition  to  this  formidable  controversy,  many  complaints  were 
preferred  by  royalists,  Quakers,  and  Episcopalians,  of  abuses 
in  the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  administration  of  Massachusetts. 
The  investigation  and  adjustment  of  these  complaints  and 
controversies  were  the  principal  reasons  assigned  for  the  royal 
commission.  But,  doubtless,  the  main  object  of  concern  to 
the  English  court  was  the  suppression  or  essential  modification 
of  institutions  founded  and  administered  on  principles  that  had 
so  long  warred  with  monarchy,  and  so  recently  prevailed  over 
it.  The  colonists  readily  believed  the  accounts  they  received 
from  their  friends  in  England  of  this  hostile  disposition  of  their 
sovereign  ;  and  the  proclamation  by  which  they  cautioned  the 
enemies  of  his  government  not  to  expect  shelter  in  Massachu 
setts  was  intended  to  remove  or  appease  it.  When  intelli 
gence  was  received  of  the  expected  visitation  from  England, 
the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  appointed  a  day  of  solemn 
fast  and  prayer  throughout  its  jurisdiction,  in  order  to  implore 
the  mercy  of  God  under  their  many  distractions  and  troubles  ; 
and  deeming  it  a  point  of  the  highest  importance  that  the  pa 
tent  or  charter  should  be  kept  "  safe  and  secret,"  they  ordered 
their  secretary  to  bring  it  into  court,  and  deliver  it  to  four  of 
the  members,  who  were  directed  to  dispose  of  it  in  such  man 
ner  as  they  should  judge  most  conducive  to  its  secure  preser 
vation.  Aware  of  the  profane,  licentious  manners  of  European 
sailors  and  soldiers,  and  reflecting  on  the  peculiar  strictness  of 
the  provincial  laws,  the  Court  adopted  at  the  same  time  the 
most  prudent  precautions  for  preventing  the  necessity  of  either 
a  hazardous  enforcement  or  a  pusillanimous  suspension  of  its 
municipal  ordinances.1 

On  the  arrival  of  the  royal  armament  at  Boston  in  the  follow 
ing  year  [1664],  the  commissioners  exhibited  their  credentials 

1  Hutchinson.     Belknap.    Sullivan.     Hazard. 


332  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

to  the  governor  and  council,  and  demanded,  in  the  first  instance, 
that  a  troop  of  provincial  militia  should  be  embodied  to  ac 
company  the  English  forces  in  the  invasion  of  New  York. 
Endicott,  the  governor,  neither  relishing  the  enterprise,  nor 
empowered  by  the  forms  of  the  provincial  constitution  to  levy 
forces  without  express  permission  from  the  General  Court, 
judged  it  necessary  to  convoke  this  body  ;  but  the  commis 
sioners,  who  had  not  leisure  to  await  its  deliberations,  pro 
ceeded  with  the  fleet  against  New  York,  desiring  that  the 
provincial  auxiliaries  should  follow  as  quickly  as  possible,  and 
signifying  to  the  governor  and  council  that  they  had  much 
important  business  to  transact  with  them  on  their  return  from 
New  York,  and  that  in  the  mean  time  the  General  Court  would 
do  well  to  bestow  a  fuller  consideration  than  they  seemed  yet 
to  have  done  on  the  letter  which  the  king  addressed  to  them 
two  years  before.  The  vague,  mysterious  terms  of  this  com 
munication  were  certainly  calculated,  and  would  seem  to  have 
been  deliberately  intended,  to  increase  the  disquiet  and  appre 
hensions  of  the  colonists.  That  they  produced  this  impres 
sion  is  manifest  from  the  transactions  that  ensued  in  the  Gen 
eral  Court. 

On  the  assembling  of  this  body,  it  was  declared  by  an  im 
mediate  and  unanimous  vote,  that  they  were  "  resolved  to  bear 
true  allegiance  to  his  Majesty,  and  to  adhere  to  a  patent  so 
dearly  obtained  and  so  long  enjoyed  by  undoubted  right." 
In  compliance  with  the  requisition  of  the  commissioners,  they 
equipped  a  regiment  of  two  hundred  men,  who  were  preparing 
to  embark  for  New  York,  when  intelligence  arrived  that  the 
place  had  already  surrendered,  and  that  the  junction  of  the 
English  and  provincial  forces  was  no  longer  necessary.  The 
assembly  then  resumed  consideration  of  the  king's  letter,  which 
was  so  emphatically  commended  to  their  attention  ;  and  passed 
a  law  extending  the  elective  franchise  to  all  the  inhabitants  of 
English  or  provincial  birth,  paying  public  rates  to  a  certain 
amount,  and  attested  by  a  minister  as  orthodox  in  their  relig 
ious  principles  and  not  immoral  in  their  lives,  whether  within 
or  without  the  pale  of  the  established  church.  They  next 
proceeded  to  frame  and  transmit  to  the  king  a  petition  strongly 
expressive  of  their  present  apprehensions  and  their  habitual 


CHAP.  IV.]          PETITION   OF   MASSACHUSETTS.  333 

sentiments.  They  represented  at  considerable  length  the  dan 
gers  and  difficulties  they  had  encountered  in  founding  and  rear 
ing  their  settlement  ;  the  explicit  confirmation  which  their 
privileges  had  received,  both  from  the  reigning  monarch  and 
his  predecessor  ;  and  their  own  recognition  of  royal  authority, 
and  willingness  to  testify  their  allegiance  in  every  righteous 
way.  They  expressed  their  concern  at  the  appointment  of 
four  commissioners,  one  of  whom  (Maverick)  was  their  known 
and  professed  enemy,  who  were  vested  with  an  indefinite  au 
thority,  in  the  exercise  of  which  they  were  to  be  guided,  not 
by  the  known  rules  of  law,  but  by  their  own  discretion  ;  and 
they  declared,  that  even  the  little  experience  which  already 
they  had  obtained  of  the  dispositions  of  these  persons  was 
sufficient  to  assure  them  that  the  powers  conferred  by  the 
commission  would  be  employed  to  the  complete  subversion  of 
the  provincial  constitution.  If  any  advantage  was  expected 
from  the  imposition  of  new  rules  and  the  infringement  of  their 
liberties,  the  design,  they  protested,  would  produce  only  dis 
appointment  to  its  authors  ;  for  the  country  was  so  poor,  that 
it  afforded  little  more  than  a  bare  subsistence  to  its  inhabitants, 
and  the  people  were  so  much  attached  to  their  institutions, 
that,  if  deprived  of  them  in  America,  they  would  seek  them 
in  new  and  more  distant  habitations  ;  and  if  they  were  driven 
out  of  their  present  territory,  it  would  not  be  easy  to  find 
another  race  of  inhabitants  who  would  be  willing  to  sojourn  in 
it.1  They  averred,  in  a  solemn  appeal  to  God,  that  they  came 
not  into  this  wilderness  in  quest  of  temporal  grandeur  or  advan 
tage,  but  for  the  sake  of  a  quiet  life  ;  and  concluded  in  the 
following  strains  of  earnest  anxiety:  —  "Let  our  government 
live,  our  patent  live,  our  magistrates  live,  our  laws  and  liber 
ties  live,  our  religious  enjoyments  live  ;  so  shall  we  all  yet 
have  farther  cause  to  say  from  our  hearts,  Let  the  king  live 
for  ever ! " 

1  It  is  curious  to  observe  the  expression  of  a  similar  sentiment  by  the  inhab 
itants  of  the  province  of  Aragon.  The  preamble  to  one  of  the  laws  of  Aragon 
declares  that  such  was  the  barrenness  of  the  country,  that,  but  for  the  sake 
of  the  liberties  by  which  they  were  distinguished  from  other  nations,  the  peo 
ple  would  abandon  it,  and  repair  in  quest  of  a  settlement  to  some  more  fruitful 
region.  Robertson's  History  of  Charles  the  Fifth.  Thucydides  (B.  I.)  ascribes 
to  the  poverty  of  its  soil  the  peculiar  adherence  of  the  Athenians  to  their 
country. 


334  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Letters  suing  for  favor  and  friendly  mediation  were  ad 
dressed  at  the  same  time  to  several  of  the  English  nobility, 
and  particularly  to  the  chancellor,  Lord  Clarendon.  But  these 
applications  were  unsuccessful.  Clarendon  was  no  friend  to 
Puritan  establishments  ;  he  had  instigated,  or  at  least  cordially 
abetted,  the  existing  persecution  against  sectaries  of  every 
denomination  in  England  ;  and  he  was  at  present  too  painfully 
sensible  of  his  declining  credit  with  the  king,  to  risk  the  farther 
provocation  of  his  displeasure  by  moving  the  suit  of  a  people 
whom  the  monarch  disliked,  and  opposing  a  favorite  scheme 
of  royal  policy.  In  a  letter  to  the  provincial  governor,  he 
defended  the  commission  as  a  constitutional  exercise  of  royal 
power  and  wisdom,  and  a  manifest  indication  of  his  Majesty's 
grace  and  goodness  ;  and  advised  the  colonists,  by  a  prompt 
submission,  to  deprecate  the  consequences  of  that  indignation 
which  their  ungrateful  clamor  must  already  have  excited  in  the 
breast  of  the  king.  The  answer  of  Charles,  which  was  trans 
mitted  by  Secretary  Morrice,  to  the  petition  of  the  General 
Court,  excited  less  surprise.  It  reproached  this  assembly 
with  making  unreasonable  and  groundless  complaints  ;  repre 
sented  the  commission  as  the  only  proper  means  of  rectifying 
the  provincial  disorders  ;  and  affected  to  consider  the  petition 
as  "the  contrivance  of  a  few  persons  who  infuse  jealousies 
into  their  fellow-subjects  as  if  their  charter  were  in  danger."1 

No  sooner  was  the  conquest  of  New  York  completed,2  than 
the  commissioners  addressed  themselves  to  the  discharge  of 
their  civil  functions  in  New  England.  One  of  the  first  official 
acts  that  they  had  occasion  to  perform  was  the  adjustment  of 
a  dispute  respecting  boundaries,  that  arose  out  of  the  occupa 
tion  of  New  York.  [1665.]  A  patent  had  been  granted  to 
the  Duke  of  York,  of  all  the  territory  occupied  or  claimed  by 
the  Dutch,  including  large  districts  already  comprehended  in 
the  charter  of  Connecticut.  A  controversy  concerning  limits 
was  thus  created  by  the  act  of  the  crown,  between  the  State 
of  Connecticut  and  the  new  province  designated  by  the  patent 
of  the  Duke  of  York.  Their  boundaries  were  now  adjusted 
by  the  commissioners  in  a  manner  which  appears  to  have  been 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers.  8  See  Book  V.,  chap.  I.,  post. 


CHAP.  IV.]        POLICY  OF  THE   COMMISSIONERS.  335 

highly  satisfactory  to  the  people  of  Connecticut,  but  which  en 
tailed  a  great  deal  of  subsequent  dispute.  Another  contro 
versy,  in  which  Connecticut  was  involved,  arose  out  of  a  claim 
to  part  of  its  territory  preferred  by  the  Duke  of  Hamilton, 
and  other  persons,  in  virtue  of  rights  that  had  accrued  to  them 
selves  or  their  ancestors  as  members  of  the  Grand  Council  of 
Plymouth.  The  commissioners,  desirous  of  giving  satisfaction 
to  both  parties,  adjudged  the  property  of  the  disputed  soil  to 
these  individual  claimants,  but  declared  that  the  municipal  gov 
ernment  of  the  territory  appertained  to  Connecticut.  It  appears 
manifestly  to  have  been  their  policy  to  detach  the  other  New 
England  States  from  the  obnoxious,  province  of  Massachusetts, 
and  to  procure  their  cooperation  (by  the  example  of  implicit 
submission  on  their  own  part,  and  the  accumulation  of  com 
plaints  against  that  province)  in  the  design  of  curtailing  her 
liberties  and  altering  her  institutions.  In  the  prosecution  of 
this  policy  they  were  but  partially  successful.  The  people  of 
Connecticut  received  the  commissioners  with  frigid  respect, 
and  plainly  showed  that  they  disliked  their  mission,  and  re 
garded  the  cause  of  Massachusetts  as  their  own.  Nay,  so 
strongly  were  they  impressed  with  the  danger  to  their  liberties 
from  the  interposition  of  such  arbitrary  power,  that  some  dis 
agreements,  which  had  arisen  between  Connecticut  and  New 
Haven,  and  hitherto  prevented  their  union  in  conformity  with 
the  recent  charter,  were  entirely  composed  by  the  mere  ti 
dings  of  the  approach  of  the  commissioners.  At  Plymouth 
the  commissioners  met  with  little  opposition  ;  the  inhabitants 
being  deterred  from  expression  of  their  sentiments  by  a  con 
sciousness  of  their  weakness,  and  being  exempted  from  the 
apprehensions  that  prevailed  in  the  provinces  of  greater  con 
sideration  by  a  sense  of  their  insignificance. 

In  Rhode  Island  alone  was  their  insidious  policy  attended 
with  success.  There,  the  people  received  them  with  studious 
deference  and  submission  ;  their  inquiries  were  answered,  and 
their  mandates  obeyed,  without  a  syllable  of  objection  to  the 
authority  from  which  they  emanated  ;  and  during  their  stay  in 
this  settlement  they  were  enabled  to  amplify  their  reports  with 
numberless  complaints  of  injustice  and  misgovernment  alleged 
to  have  been  committed  in  Massachusetts.  The  inhabitants 


HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

of  Rhode  Island,  as  we  have  seen,  gained  their  late  charter  by 
a  display  of  subservience  and  devotion  to  the  crown  ;  and  the 
liberal  institutions  which  it  introduced  had  not  yet  had  time  to 
form  a  spirit  that  disdained  to  hold  the  enjoyment  of  liberty  by 
so  ignoble  a  tenure.  The  freedom  thus  spuriously  begotten 
was  tainted  in  its  birth  by  principles  that  long  rendered  its  ex 
istence  precarious  ;  and  we  shall  find  these  colonists,  a  few 
years  after,  abjectly  proposing  to  strip  themselves  of  the  rights 
which  they  gained  so  ill,  and  of  which  they  now  showed  them 
selves  unworthy,  by  their  willingness  to  cooperate  in  attacking 
the  liberties  of  Massachusetts.  We  must  not,  however,  dis 
card  from  our  recollection  that  Rhode  Island  was  yet  but  a 
feeble  community,  and  that  the  unfavorable  sentiments  with 
which  many  of  its  inhabitants  regarded  Massachusetts  arose 
from  the  persecution  which  their  religious  tenets  had  experi 
enced  in  this  province.  Their  conduct  to  the  commissioners 
received  the  warmest  approbation  from  Charles,  who  assured 
them  that  he  would  never  be  unmindful  of  the  claims  they 
had  acquired  on  his  goodness  by  a  demeanour  so  replete  with 
loyalty  and  humility.1  In  justice  to  the  king,  whose  word  was 
proverbially  the  object  of  very  little  reliance,  we  may  observe 
that  he  never  actually  contradicted  these  professions  of  favor 
for  Rhode  Island  ;  and  in  justice  to  a  moral  lesson  that  would 
be  otherwise  incomplete,  we  may  here  so  far  transgress  the 
pace  of  time,  as  to  remark,  that,  when  Charles's  successor  ex 
tended  to  Rhode  Island  the  same  tyrannical  system  which  he 
introduced  into  the  other  New  England  provinces,  and  when 
the  people  endeavoured  to  avert  the  blow  by  a  repetition  of  the 
abject  pliancy  that  had  formerly  availed  them,  their  prostration 
was  disregarded,  and  their  complete  subjugation  pursued  and 
accomplished  with  an  insolence  that  forcibly  taught  them  to 
detest  oppression  and  despise  servility. 

It  was  in  Massachusetts  that  the  commission  was  expected 
to  produce  its  most  important  effects  ;  and  from  the  difference 
between  the  views  and  opinions  entertained  by  the  English 
government  and  by  the  provincial  authorities,  it  was  easily 
foreseen  that  the  proceedings  of  the  commissioners  would 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


CHAP.  IV.]  VIEWS  OF  ALLEGIANCE  IN  MASSACHUSETTS.  337 

provoke  a  keen  and  resolute  opposition.  Among  other  com 
munications,  which  the  commissioners  were  charged  to  convey 
to  the  colonists,  was,  that  the  king  considered  them  to  stand 
in  precisely  the  same  relation  to  him  as  the  inhabitants  of  Kent 
or  Yorkshire  in  England.  Very  different  was  the  opinion 
which  the  colonists  themselves  entertained.  They  considered, 
that,  having  been  forced  by  persecution  to  depart  from  the 
realm  of  England,  and  having  established  themselves  by  their 
own  unassisted  efforts  in  territories  which  they  purchased  from 
the  natural  proprietors,  they  retained  no  other  political  con 
nection  with  their  sovereign  than  what  was  created  by  their 
charter,  which  they  regarded  as  the  sole  existing  compact  be 
tween  the  English  crown  and  themselves,  and  as  defining  all 
the  particulars  and  limits  of  their  obedience.  The  acknowl 
edged  difference  of  sentiment  in  religion  and  politics  between 
them  and  their  ancient  rulers,  from  which  their  colonial  settle 
ment  originated,  and  the  habits  of  self-government  that  they 
had  long  been  enabled  to  indulge,  confirmed  these  preposses 
sions,  and  tended  generally  and  deeply  to  impress  the  convic 
tion,  that  their  primitive  allegiance,  as  natives  of  England  and 
subjects  of  the  British  crown,  was  entirely  dissolved  and  super 
seded  by  the  stipulations  which  they  had  voluntarily  contracted 
by  accepting  their  charter.  Such  opinions,  though  strongly 
cherished,  it  was  not  prudent  distinctly  to  profess  ;  but  their 
prevalence  is  attested  by  a  respectable  provincial  historian,  on 
the  authority  of  certain  manuscript  compositions  of  the  leading 
persons  in  Massachusetts  at  this  period,  which  he  had  an  op 
portunity  of  perusing.  The  colonists  were  not  the  less  attached 
to  these  notions,  from  the  apprehension  that  they  would  find  as 
little  favor  in  the  eyes  of  the  English  government  as  the  tenets 
which  had  led  to  the  persecution  and  emigration  of  their  an 
cestors  ;  they  were,  indeed,  quite  repugnant  to  the  principles  of 
the  English  law,  which  regards  the  allegiance  of  subjects  to 
their  sovereign,  not  as  a  local  or  provincial,  but  as  a  perpetual 
and  indissoluble  tie,  which  distance  of  place  does  not  sunder, 
nor  lapse  of  time  relax.  Forcibly  aware  of  these  differences 
of  opinion,  of  the  dangerous  collisions  which  might  result  from 
them,  and  of  the  disadvantage  with  which  they  must  conduct 
a  discussion  with  persons  who  sought  nothing  so  much  as  to 
VOL.  i.  43 


338  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

find  or  make  them  offenders,  the  colonists  awaited,  with  much 
anxiety,  the  return  of  the  commissioners  to  Boston.1 

The  character  and  disposition  of  these  commissioners  in 
creased  the  probability  of  an  unfriendly  issue  to  their  debates 
with  the  provincial  authorities.  If  conciliation  was,  as  the  king 
professed,  the  object  which  he  had  in  view  in  instituting  the 
commission,  he  was  singularly  unfortunate  in  the  selection  of 
the  instruments  to  whom  the  discharge  of  its  important  duties 
was  confided.  Nichols,  indeed,  was  a  man  of  honor,  good 
sense,  and  ability  ;  but  it  was  mainly  for  the  reduction  and 
subsequent  governance  of  New  York  that  he  had  been  ap 
pointed  to  accompany  the  expedition  ;  he  remained  at  that 
place  after  its  capitulation  ;  and  when  he  afterwards  rejoined 
his  colleagues,  he  found  himself  unable  to  control  their  con 
duct,  or  repair  the  breach  which  they  had  already  occasioned. 
The  other  commissioners  were  utterly  destitute  of  the  temper,2 
sense,  and  address  which  their  office  demanded ;  and  Maverick 
added  to  these  defects  an  inveterate  hostility  to  the  colony, 
which  had  induced  him  for  years  to  solicit  the  functions  which 
he  now  hastened  to  execute  with  malignant  satisfaction.  On 
their  return  to  Boston  [April,  1665],  the  very  first  communi 
cation  which  they  addressed  to  the  governor  demonstrated  the 
slight  respect  they  entertained  for  the  provincial  authorities  ; 
for  they  required  that  ah"  the  inhabitants  of  the  province  should 
be  assembled  to  receive  and  reply  to  their  communication  ; 
and  when  the  governor  desired  to  know  the  cause  of  this 
requisition,  they  answered,  "  that  the  motion  was  so  reason 
able,  that  he  who  would  not  attend  to  it  was  a  traitor."  Per 
ceiving,  however,  that  this  violent  language  served  rather  to 
confirm  the  suspicions  than  to  shake  the  resolution  of  the  pro- 

1  Hutchinson. 

2  The  senselessness  of  their  conduct  is  strongly  illustrated  by  a  case  related 
at  considerable  length  by  the  provincial  historians.     They  had  been  drinking, 
one  Saturday  night,  in  a  tavern,  after  the  hour  when,  by  the  provincial  laws, 
all  taverns  were  ordered  to  be  shut.     A  constable,  who  warned  them  not  to 
infringe  the  law,  was  beaten  by  them.     Hearing  that  Mason,  another  con 
stable,  had  declared  that  he  would  not  have  been  deterred  by  their  violence 
from  doing  his  duty,  they  sent  for  him,  and  extorted  from  him  an  admission 
that  he  would  have  arrested  the  king  himself,  if  he  had  found  him  drinking  in 
a  public  house  after  lawful  hours.     They  insisted  that  he  should  be  tried  for 
high  treason,  and  actually  prevailed  to  have  this  injustice  committed.     The 
jury  returned  a  special  verdict ;  and  the  court,  considering  the  words  offensive 
and  insolent,  but  not  treasonable,  inflicted  only  a  slight  punishment.  —  Hutch- 


CHAP.  IV.]     DISPUTES   WITH  THE  COMMISSIONERS.  339 

vincial  magistrates,  they  condescended  for  a  while  to  adopt  a 
more  conciliating  tone,  and  informed  the  General  Court  that 
they  had  favorably  represented  to  the  king  the  promptness  with 
which  his  commands  had  been  obeyed  in  the  equipment  of  a  pro 
vincial  regiment ;  but  it  was  soon  ascertained  that  they  had  ac 
tually  transmitted  a  representation  of  perfectly  opposite  import. 
The  suspicions  which  the  commissioners  and  the  Gen 
eral  Court  reciprocally  entertained  of  each  other  prevented, 
from  the  outset,  any  cordial  cooperation  between  them.  The 
communications  of  the  commissioners  display  the  most  lofty 
ideas  of  their  own  authority  as  representatives  of  the  crown, 
with  a  preconceived  opinion  that  there  was  an  indisposition  on 
the  part  of  the  General  Court  to  pay  due  respect  to  their  au 
thority,  as  well  as  to  the  source  from  which  it  was  derived. 
The  answers  of  the  General  Court  manifest  an  anxious  desire 
to  avoid  a  quarrel  with  the  king,  and  to  gratify  his  Majesty  by 
professions  of  loyalty  and  submission,  and  by  every  municipal 
change  that  seemed  likely  to  meet  his  wishes,  without  com 
promising  the  fundamental  principles  of  their  peculiar  polity. 
They  expressed,  at  the  same  time,  a  deliberate  conviction  of 
having  done  nothing  that  merited  displeasure  or  required  apolo 
gy,  and  a  steady  determination  to  abide  by  the  charter.  The 
correspondence  gradually  degenerated  into  altercation.  At 
length,  the  commissioners  demanded  from  the  Court  an  ex 
plicit  answer  to  the  question,  if  they  acknowledged  the  au 
thority  of  his  Majesty's  commission.  But  the  Court  desired 
to  be  excused  from  giving  any  other  answer  than  that  they 
acknowledged  the  authority  of  his  Majesty's  charter,  with 
which  they  were  much  better  acquainted.  Finding  that  their 
object  was  not  to  be  gained  by  threats  or  expostulations,  the 
commissioners  attempted  a  practical  assertion  of  their  preten 
sions  ;  they  granted  letters  of  protection  to  persons  who  were 
prosecuted  before  the  provincial  tribunals  ;  and  in  a  civil  suit, 
which  was  already  determined  by  the  provincial  judges,  they 
promoted  an  appeal  to  themselves  from  the  unsuccessful  party, 
and  summoned  him  and  his  adversary  to  plead  before  them. 
The  General  Court  perceived  that  they  must  now  or  never 
make  a  stand  in  defence  of  their  authority ;  and  with  a  decision 
which  showed  the  high  value  they  entertained  for  their  privi- 


340  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

leges,  and  the  vigor  with  which  they  were  prepared  to  guard 
them,  they  publicly  proclaimed  their  disapprobation  of  this 
measure,  and  declared,  that,  in  discharge  of  their  duty  to  God 
and  the  king,  and  in  faithfulness  to  the  trust  reposed  in  them 
by  the  king's  good  subjects  in  the  colony,  they  must  protest 
against  the  proceedings  of  the  commissioners,  and  disclaim 
friendship  with  all  who  would  countenance  or  abet  them. 
They  accompanied  this  vigorous  demonstration  with  an  offer 
to  compromise  the  dispute  by  rejudging  the  cause  themselves 
in  presence  of  the  commissioners  ;  but  this  proposition  was 
scornfully  rejected,  and  every  effort  to  establish  harmony  be 
tween  these  conflicting  authorities  proved  unavailing. 

Suspending  for  a  time  their  operations  at  Boston,  the  com 
missioners  repaired  to  New  Hampshire  and  Maine,  and  in 
stantly  pronouncing  sentence  in  favor  of  the  claims  of  Mason 
and  Gorges  against  the  jurisdiction  of  Massachusetts,  they  sup 
pressed  the  existing  authorities,  and  erected  a  new  system  of 
government  in  each  of  those  provinces.  On  their  return  to 
Boston,  the  General  Court  declared  that  these  measures  tend 
ed  to  the  disturbance  of  the  public  peace,  and  demanded  a 
conference  with  the  commissioners,  which  was  refused  with  an 
asperity  of  reproach  that  excluded  all  farther  correspondence. 
Sir  Robert  Carr  even  went  the  length  of  assuring  the  General 
Court  that  the  king's  pardon  for  their  manifold  treasons  during 
the  civil  war  had  been  merely  conditional  and  was  now  for 
feited  by  their  evil  behaviour,  and  that  the  contrivers  of  their 
late  measures  would  speedily  endure  the  same  punishment 
which  their  associates  in  rebellion  had  recently  experienced  in 
England. 

The  king,  having  been  apprized  of  these  transactions,  and 
assured  by  the  commissioners  that  it  was  fruitless  for  them  to 
prolong  a  discussion  with  persons  who  were  determined  to  mis 
construe  all  their  words  and  actions,  issued  letters,  recalling 
these  functionaries  to  England  [1666],  expressing  his  satis 
faction  with  the  conduct  of  all  the  colonies  except  Massachu 
setts,  and  commanding  the  General  Court  of  this  province  to 
send  deputies  to  answer  in  his  presence  the  charges  preferred 
against  their  countrymen.  But  the  inhabitants  of  Massachu 
setts  were  aware  that  in  such  a  controversy  they  had  not  the 


CHAP.  IV.]   MEASURES  FOR  CONCILIATING  THE  KING.    341 

remotest  chance  of  success,  and  that  it  was  not  by  reasonable 
pleas,  or  the  cogency  of  argument,  that  they  could  hope  to 
pacify  the  displeasure  of  their  sovereign.  Instead  of  comply 
ing  with  his  injunction,  the  General  Court  addressed  a  letter 
to  the  secretary  of  state,  in  which  they  hinted  real  or  pretended 
doubts  of  the  authenticity  of  the  royal  mandate,  and  declared 
that  their  cause  had  already  been  so  plainly  and  minutely  un 
folded,  that  the  ablest  among  them  would  be  utterly  incapable 
of  rendering  it  any  clearer.  At  the  same  time  they  endeav 
oured  to  appease  his  Majesty  by  humble  addresses  expressive  of 
their  loyalty  ;  and  in  order  to  demonstrate  the  sense  they  at 
tached  to  these  professions,  they  purchased  a  ship-load  of 
masts  which  they  presented  to  the  king  ;  and  learning  that  his 
fleet  in  the  West  Indies  was  distressed  by  want  of  provisions, 
they  promoted  a  contribution  among  themselves,  and  victualled 
it  at  their  own  expense.  Charles  accepted  their  presents  very 
graciously  ;  and  a  letter  under  the  sign  manual  having  been 
transmitted  to  the  General  Court,  declaring  that  their  zeal  for 
the  royal  service  was  "  taken  well  by  his  Majesty,"  the  cloud 
that  had  gathered  over  the  colony  in  this  quarter  seemed  for 
the  present  to  be  dispersed.1  Nevertheless,  the  design  that 
had  been  so  far  disclosed  of  remodelling  the  institutions  of 
New  England  was  by  no  means  abandoned.  The  report  of 
the  commissioners  furnished  Charles  with  the  very  pretexts 
that  were  wanting  to  the  accomplishment  of  his  plans  ;  and 
the  measures  which  he  embraced,  at  a  later  period,  demon 
strated  that  it  was  not  the  dutiful  professions  or  liberalities  of 
the  colonists  that  would  deter  him  from  availing  himself  of  the 
advantages  which  he  had  made  such  efforts  to  obtain.  But  the 
dreadful  affliction  of  the  plague,  —  which  broke  out  with  such 
violence,  as  in  one  year  to  destroy  ninety  thousand  of  the  in 
habitants  of  London,  and  to  transfer  for  a  time  the  seat  of  gov 
ernment  to  Oxford,  —  the  great  fire  of  London,2  the  wars  and 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 

2  A  liberal  contribution  was  made  by  the   people  of  Massachusetts,  and 
transmitted  to  London,  for  relief  of  the  sufferers  by  the  fire.     Hutchinson. 
We   have  seen   their  kindness  honorably  repaid   [1836],  by  a  subscription 
among  the  citizens  of  London  for  relief  of  the  sufferers  by  a  vast  conflagra 
tion  at  New  York.     The  people  of  New  England  have  always  been  honor 
ably  distinguished  by  their  charitable  participation  of  the  misfortunes  of  other 
communities.     In  the  year  1703,  they  contributed  £2,000  for  the  relief  of  the 


342  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

intrigues  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  and  the  rising  discon 
tents  of  the  people  of  Britain,  so  forcibly  engaged  the  attention 
of  the  king,  as  to  suspend  for  a  while  the  execution  of  his 
designs  against  the  institutions  of  New  England. 

After  the  departure  of  the  royal  commissioners,  the  prov 
inces  of  New  England  enjoyed  for  some  years  a  quiet  and 
prosperous  condition.  The  only  disturbance  which  their  in 
ternal  tranquillity  sustained  arose  from  the  persecutions,  which, 
in  all  the  States  except  Rhode  Island,  continued  to  be  waged 
against  the  Anabaptists,  as  these  sectaries,  from  time  to  time, 
attracted  notice  by  attempting  to  propagate  their  tenets.  Let 
ters  were  written  in  their  behalf  to  the  provincial  magistrates 
by  the  most  eminent  dissenting  ministers  in  England  ;  but 
though  it  was  strongly  urged  by  the  writers  of  these  letters, 
that  the  severe  persecution  which  the  Anabaptists  were  then 
enduring  in  the  parent  state  should  recommend  them  to  the 
sympathy  of  the  colonists,  and  that  their  conversion  was  more 
likely  to  be  accomplished  by  exemplifying  to  them  the  peace 
able  fruits  of  righteousness  than  by  attacking  their  doctrines 
with  penal  inflictions,  which  could  have  no  other  effect  than  to 
render  them  martyrs  or  hypocrites,  the  intercession,  though 
respectfully  received,  was  completely  unavailing.  The  pro 
vincial  authorities  persisted  in  believing  that  they  were  doing 
God  service  by  employing  the  civil  power  with  which  they 
were  invested  to  guard  their  territories  from  the  intrusion  of 
what  they  deemed  heresy,  and  to  maintain  the  purity  of  those 
religious  principles  for  the  culture  and  preservation  [of  which 
their  settlements  were  originally  founded.  A  considerable  num 
ber  of  Anabaptists  were  fined,  imprisoned,  and  banished  ;  and 
persecution  produced  its  usual  effect  of  confirming  the  senti- 

inhabitants  of -Nevis  and  St.  Christophers,  which  had  been  ravaged  by  the 
French.  Holmes.  In  the  same  year,  they  had  an  opportunity  of  showing  that 
their  hands  were  as  ready  to  repel  the  danger  as  to  relieve  the  calamities  of 
their  friends.  The  planters  of  Jamaica  having  besought  the  assistance  of 
New  England  to  repel  an  invasion  that  was  apprehended  from  the  French, 
two  regiments  were  promptly  embodied  and  despatched  for  this  purpose  to 
Jamaica,  where  they  remained  two  years.  Oldmixon  (2d  edit.').  Military  aid 
was  not  the  only  benefit  which  the  West  India  planters  derived  from  New 
England,  which  .appears  frequently  to  have  supplied  them,  at  their  request, 
with  ministers  of  religion.  Holmes.  Of  the  generous  exertions  of  the  New- 
Englanders,  both  for  the  instruction  and  the  defence  of  the  colonists  of  Caro 
lina,  some  notice  will  be  found  in  Book  IV.,  Chap.  II.,  and  Book  VIII., 
Chap.  II.,  post. 


CHAP.  IV.]        CESSION   OF  ACADIA  TO  FRANCE.  343 

ments  and  propagating  the  tenets  which  it  sought  to  extirpate,  by 
causing  their  professors  to  connect  them  in  their  own  minds, 
and  to  exhibit  them  to  others  in  connection,  with  suffering  for 
conscience's  sake.  These  proceedings,  however,  contributed 
more  to  stain  the  character  of  the  colonists  than  to  disturb  their 
tranquillity.  Much  greater  disquiet  was  created  by  the  intelli 
gence  of  the  cession  of  Acadia,  or,  as  it  was  now  generally 
termed,  Nova  Scotia,  to  the  French  by  the  treaty  of  Breda. 
[1667.]  Nothing  had  contributed  more  to  promote  the  com 
merce  and  security  of  New  England  than  the  conquest  of  that 
province  by  Cromwell  ;  and  the  inhabitants  of  Massachusetts, 
apprized  of  the  extreme  solicitude  of  the  French  to  regain  it, 
and  justly  regarding  such  an  issue  as  pregnant  with  mischief 
and  danger  to  themselves,  sent  agents  to  England  to  remon 
strate  against  it.  But  the  influence  of  France  prevailed  with 
the  British  monarch  over  the  interest  of  his  people  ;  and  the 
conduct  of  Charles  on  this  occasion  betrayed  as  much  indiffer 
ence  for  the  external  security  of  the  colonies,  as  his  previous 
measures  had  disclosed  for  their  domestic  liberties.  The 
French  regained  possession  of  their  ancient  settlement  ;  and 
both  New  England  and  the  mother  country  had  afterwards 
abundant  cause  to  regret  the  admission  of  a  restless  and  am 
bitious  neighbour,  who  for  a  long  course  of  time  exerted  her 
peculiar  arts  of  intrigue  to  interrupt  the  pursuits  and  disturb  the 
repose  of  the  British  colonists.1 

The  system  of  government  that  prevailed  in  Massachusetts 
coincided  with  the  sentiments  of  a  great  majority  of  the  people  ; 
and  even  those  acts  of  municipal  administration  that  imposed 
restraints  on  civil  liberty  were  reverenced  on  account  of  their 
manifest  design  and  their  supposed  efficiency  to  promote  an 
object  which  the  people  held  dearer  than  civil  liberty  itself. 
A  printing-press  had  been  established  at  Cambridge  for  up 
wards  of  twenty  years  ;  and  the  General  Court  had  recently 
appointed  two  persons  to  be  licensers  of  the  press,  and  prohib 
ited  the  publication  of  any  book  or  other  composition  that  was 
not  sanctioned  by  their  censorial  approbation.  The  licensers 
having  authorized  the  publication  of  Thomas  a  Kempis's  ad- 

1  Neal      Chalmers. 


344  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

mirable  treatise  De  Imitatione  Christi,  the  Court  interposed 
[1668],  and,  declaring  that  "  the  book  was  written  by  a  pop 
ish  minister,  and  contained  some  things  less  safe  to  be  infused 
among  the  people,"  recommended  a  more  diligent  revisal  to 
the  licensers,  and  in  the  meantime  suspended  the  publication. 
In  a  constitution  less  popular,  a  measure  of  this  nature  would 
have  been  regarded  as  an  outrage  upon  liberty.  But  the  gov 
ernment  of  Massachusetts  expressed  and  was  supported  by  the 
feelings  and  opinions  of  the  people  ;  and  so  generally  respected 
was  its  administration,  that  the  inhabitants  of  New  Hampshire 
and  Maine,  rejecting  the  form  of  municipal  authority  which  they 
received  from  the  royal  commissioners,  again  solicited  and  were 
received  into  the  rank  of  dependencies  on  its  jurisdiction.  All 
traces  of  the  visitation  of  these  commissioners  being  thus  ef 
faced,  and  the  apprehensions  excited  by  their  measures  forgot 
ten,  the  affairs  of  the  New  England  colonies  continued  for 
several  years  to  glide  on  in  a  course  of  silent  but  cheerful 
prosperity.1  The  Navigation  Act,  not  being  aided  by  the 
establishment  of  an  efficient  custom-house,  and  depending  for 
its  execution  upon  officers  annually  elected  by  their  own  fellow- 
citizens,  was  completely  disregarded.  [1668—1672.]  The 
people  enjoyed  a  commerce  practically  unrestricted  ;  a  conse 
quent  increase  of  wealth  was  visible  among  the  merchants  and 
farmers  ;  and  habits  of  industry  and  economy  continuing  to 

1  In  the  year  1669,  the  inhabitants  of  Portsmouth,  in  New  Hampshire,  pre 
sented  an  address  to  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  signifying,  "that,  al 
though  they  had  articled  with  them  for  exemption  from  taxes,  yet  they  had 
never  articled  with  God  and  their  own  consciences  for  exemption  from  grati 
tude,"  and  that  they  now  pledged  themselves  for  seven  years  to  an  annual 
contribution  of  sixty  pounds  sterling  to  the  funds  of  Harvard  College.  —  Q,uin- 
cy's  History  of  Harvard  University. 

In  the  year  1672,  the  laws  of  Connecticut  (till  then  preserved  in  manuscript, 
and  promulgated  by  oral  proclamation)  were  collected  into  a  code,  printed, 
and  published.  The  Preface,  written  with  great  solemnity,  commences  in 
this  manner  :  —  "  To  our  beloved  brethren  and  neighbours,  the  inhabitants  of 
Connecticut,  the  General  Court  of  that  colony  wish  grace  and  peace  in  our 
Lord  Jesus."  It  was  ordered  that  every  householder  should  have  a  copy  of 
the  code,  and  should  read  it  weekly  to  his  family.  Trumbull.  The  legislators 
of  Connecticut  seem  to  have  thought,  like  Agesilaus,  that  the  duties  of  a  citi 
zen  should  form  part  of  the  earliest  education  of  a  child. 

In  Connecticut,  by  a  law  of  1667,  three  years'  voluntary  separation  of  mar 
ried  persons  is  held  to  dissolve  their  matrimonial  engagement.  It  is  strange 
that  a  law  departing  so  widely  from  the  injunctions  of  Scripture  should  have 
gained  admission  into  the  codes  of  Scotland  and  of  New  England,  —  two 
countries  long  distinguished  above  all  others  by  the  general  and  zealous  de 
sire  of  their  people  to  harmonize  their  municipal  ordinances  with  the  canons 
of  Scripture. 


CHAP.  IV.]         PROSPERITY  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  345 

• 

prevail  with  unabated  force,  the  plantations  underwent  a  pro 
gressive  improvement,  and  many  new  settlements  arose. 

From  a  document  preserved  in  the  archives  of  the  colonial 
office  of  London,  and  published  by  Chalmers,  it  appears,  that, 
in  the  year  1673,  New  England  was  estimated  to  contain  one 
hundred  and  twenty  thousand  souls,  of  whom  about  sixteen 
thousand  were  able  to  bear  arms  ;  and  of  the  merchants  and 
planters  there  were  no  fewer  than  five  thousand  persons,  each 
of  whom  was  worth  £  SjOOO.1  Three  fourths  of  the  wealth 
and  population  of  the  country  centred  in  the  territory  of  Mas 
sachusetts  and  its  dependencies.  The  town  of  Boston  alone 
contained  fifteen  hundred  families.  Theft  was  rare,  and  beg 
gary  unknown  in  New  England.  Josselyn,  who  returned  about 
two  years  before  this  period  from  his  second  visit  to  America, 
commends  highly  the  beauty  and  agreeableness  of  the  towns 
and  villages  of  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut,  and  the  sub 
stantial  structure  and  interior  comfort  of  all  the  private  dwel 
lings.2  During  this  interval  of  tranquil  prosperity,  many  of  the 
more  aged  inhabitants  of  New  England  closed  the  career  of  a 
long  and  eventful  life  ;  and  the  original  race  of  settlers  was  now 
almost  entirely  extinguished.  The  annals  of  this  period  are 
filled  with  accounts  of  their  deaths,  —  of  the  virtues  by  which 
they  contributed  to  the  foundation  of  the  new  commonwealth, 
and  of  the  fondness  with  which  their  closing  eyes  lingered  upon 
its  flourishing  estate.  To  our  retrospective  view,  enlarged  by 
the  knowledge  which  history  supplies  of  the  impending  calami 
ties  from  which  these  persons  were  thus  seasonably  removed, 
not  the  least  enviable  circumstance  of  their  lot  appears  to  have 
been,  that  they  died  in  scenes  so  fraught  with  serene  enjoy 
ment  and  cheering  promise,  and  bequeathed  to  their  descend 
ants  at  once  the  bright  example  of  their  virtue,  and  the  sub 
stantial  fruits  of  it,  in  a  singularly  happy  and  prosperous  con 
dition.  Yet,  so  short-sighted  and  fallacious  are  the  prospec 
tive  regards  of  men,  —  so  strongly  are  they  led  by  an  instinc- 

1  John  Dunton,  who  visited  New  England  about  twelve  years  after  this 
period,  mentions  a  merchant  in  Salem  worth  £  30,000.  —  Dunton's  Life  and 
Errors. 

2  Josselyn's  Second  Voyage:    Even  at  this  early  period,  Josselyn  has  re 
marked  the  prevalence  of  that  inveterate  but  unexplained  peculiarity,  of  the 
premature  decay  of  the  teeth  of  white  persons,  and  especially  women,  in 
North  America. 

VOL.  i.  44 


346  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

live  and  unquenchable  propensity  to  figure  and  desire  some 
thing  better  than  they  behold,  —  and  so  apt  to  restrict  to  the 
present  fleeting  and  disordered  scene  the  suggestions  of  this 
secret  longing  after  original  and  immortal  perfection,  —  that 
many  of  the  fathers  of  the  colony,  even  when,  full  of  days  and 
honor,  they  beheld  their  latter  end  crowned  with  peace,  could 
not  refrain  from  lamenting  that  they  had  been  born  too  soon  to 
see  more  than  the  first  faint  dawn  of  New  England's  glory. 
Others,  with  greater  enlargement  of  wisdom  and  piety,  remem 
bered  the  Scriptural  declaration,  that  the  eye  is  not  satisfied 
with  seeing ;  acknowledged  that  the  conceptions  of  an  immortal 
spirit  are  incapable  of  being  adequately  filled  by  any  thing  short 
of  the  vision  .of  its  Divine  Author,  for  whose  contemplation  it 
was  created  ;  and  were  contented  to  drop  like  leaves  into  the 
bosom  of  their  adopted  country,  and  resign  to  a  succeeding 
race  the  enjoyment  and  promotion  of  her  glory,  in  the  confi 
dence  of  their  own  renovated  existence  in  scenes  of  more  ele 
vated  and  durable  felicity.1 

The  state  of  prosperous  repose  which  New  England  enjoyed 
for  several  years  was  interrupted  by  a  general  conspiracy  of  the 
Indian  tribes  [1674],  that  produced  a  war  so  bloody  and  for 
midable  as  to  threaten  for  some  time  the  utter  destruction  of 
all  the  settlements.  This  hostile  combination  was  promoted 
by  a  young  chief  whose  history  reminds  us  of  the  exploits  of 
Opechancanough  in  Virginia.  He  was  the  second  son  of 
Massasoit,  a  prince  who  ruled  a  powerful  tribe  inhabiting  ter 
ritories  adjacent  to  the  settlement  of  Plymouth  at  the  time 
when  the  English  first  gained  a  footing  in  the  country.  The 
father  had  entered  into  an  alliance  with  the  colonists,  and, 
after  his  death,  his  two  sons  expressed  an  earnest  desire  to 
retain  and  cultivate  their  friendship.  They  even  requested  of 
the  magistrates  of  Plymouth,  as  a  mark  of  identification  with 
their  allies,  that  English  names  might  be  given  them  ;  and,  in 
compliance  with  their  desire,  the  elder  received  the  name  of 
Alexander,  and  the  younger  of  Philip.  But  these  expressions 
of  good-will  were  prompted  entirely  by  the  artifice  that  regu 
lated  their  schemes  of  hostility  ;  and  they  were  both  shortly 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers.    Neal. 


CHAP.  IV.]  INDIAN  CONSPIRACY.  347 

after  detected  and  disappointed  in  a  treacherous  attempt  to  in 
volve  the  Narragansets  in  hostilities  with  the  colonists.  The 
haughty  spirit  of  the  elder  brother  was  overwhelmed  by  this 
disgrace.  Unable  to  brook  the  detection  and  discomfiture  of 
his  perfidy,  and  perhaps  additionally  stung  by  the  generous 
clemency  of  the  colonists,  which  lent  aggravation  to  his  infamy, 
he -abandoned  himself  to  despair,  and  died  of  the  corrosion  of 
rage  and  mortification.  Philip,  after  the  death  of  his  brother, 
renewed  the  alliance  between  his  tribe  and  the  English  ;  but 
nothing  was  farther  from  his  thoughts  than  the  fulfilment  of  his 
engagements.  Subtle,  fierce,  artful,  and  dissembling,  yet  stern 
in  adventurous  purpose  and  relentless  cruelty,  he  meditated  a 
universal  conspiracy  of  the  Indians  for  the  extirpation  of  the 
colonists,  and  for  several  years  pursued  this  design  as  secretly 
and  successfully  as  the  numerous  difficulties  that  encompassed 
him  would  permit.  Next  to  the  growing  power  of  the  Euro 
pean  settlers,  nothing  more  keenly  provoked  his  indignation 
than  the  progress  of  their  missionary  labors  ;  and,  in  reality,  it 
was  to  these  labors,  and  some  of  the  consequences  they  pro 
duced,  that  the  colonists  were  indebted  for  their  preservation 
from  the  ruin  that  would  have  attended  the  success  of  Philip's 
machinations.  Some  of  the  tribes  to  whom  he  applied  re 
vealed  his  propositions  to  the  missionaries  ;  and  several  Indians 
who  had  embraced  his  schemes  were  persuaded  by  their  con 
verted  brethren  to  renounce  them.  The  magistrates  of  Ply 
mouth  frequently  remonstrated  with  him  on  the  dishonor  he 
incurred  and  the  danger  he  provoked  by  the  perfidious  mach 
inations  of  which  from  time  to  time  they  obtained  informa 
tion  ;  and  by  renewed  and  more  solemn  engagements  than 
before,  he  endeavoured  to  disarm  their  vigilance  and  allay  their 
apprehension.  For  two  or  three  years  before  the  present 
period,  he  pursued  his  hostile  projects  with  such  successful 
duplicity  as  to  elude  discovery  and  even  suspicion  ;  and  had 
now  succeeded  in  uniting  some  of  the  fiercest  and  most  power 
ful  of  the  Indian  tribes  in  a  confederacy  to  make  war  on  the 
colonists  to  the  point  of  extermination. 

A  converted  Indian,  who  was  laboring  as  a  missionary 
among  the  tribes  of  his  countrymen,  having  discovered  the 
plot,  revealed  it  to  the  governor  of  Plymouth,  and  was  soon 


348  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

after  found  dead  in  a  field,  under  circumstances  that  left  no 
doubt  of  assassination.  Some  neighbouring  Indians,  suspected 
of  being  the  perpetrators  of  this  crime,  were  apprehended, 
and  solemnly  tried  before  a  jury  consisting  half  of  English  and 
half  of  Indians,  who  returned  a  verdict  of  guilty.  At  their 
execution,  one  of  the  convicts  confessed  the  murder,  —  declar 
ing,  withal,  that  its  commission  had  been  planned  and  instigated 
by  Philip  ;  and  this  crafty  chief,  alarmed  at  the  perilous  dis 
closure,  now  threw  off  the  mask,  and  summoned  his  confeder 
ates  to  his  aid.  The  States  of  Massachusetts,  Plymouth,  and 
Connecticut  took  arms  for  their  common  defence,  —  having 
first  employed  every  means  to  induce  Philip  to  accommodate 
the  quarrel  by  a  friendly  treaty.  But  a  bloodless  issue  was 
not  what  Philip  desired  ;  and  perceiving  that  the  season  of 
secret  conspiracy  was  over,  he  rejected  all  negotiation,  and 
commenced  a  general  war  [1675],  which  was  carried  on  with 
great  vigor  and  various  success.  Though  Philip's  own  tribe 
supplied  no  more  than  five  hundred  warriors,  he  had  so  in 
creased  his  force  by  alliances  that  he  was  able  to  bring  three 
thousand  men  into  the  field.  This  formidable  host,  conducted 
by  a  chief  who  was  persuaded  that  the  war  must  terminate  in 
the  total  ruin  of  one  or  other  of  the  conflicting  parties,  made 
exertions  of  which  the  Indians  were  hitherto  supposed  incapa 
ble.  Several  battles  were  fought,  and  all  the  fury,  havoc,  and 
cruelty  which  distinguish  Indian  warfare  were  experienced  in 
their  fullest  extent  by  the  English.  Wherever  the  enemy 
marched,  their  route  was  marked  with  slaughter  and  desolation. 
Massachusetts  and  Plymouth  were  the  States  that  suffered 
principally  from  the  contest.  There,  especially,  the  Indians 
were  so  mingled  with  the  European  colonists,  that  there  was 
scarcely  a  part  of  the  country  which  was  not  exposed  to  dan 
ger,  or  a  family  which  had  not  to  bewail  the  loss  of  a  relative 
or  friend.  In  a  woodland  scene  near  the  village  of  Deerfield, 
in  Massachusetts,  Captain  Lothrop  and  a  party  of  the  provin 
cial  troops  were  suddenly  attacked  by  an  Indian  force  com 
manded  by  Philip  himself ;  and,  unaware  that  to  encounter  such 
an  enemy  with  effect  he  ought  to  place  his  men  in  phalanx, 
Lothrop  posted  them  separately  behind  trees,  where  he  and  ev 
ery  one  of  them,  to  the  number  of  ninety-three,  were  presently 


CHAP.  IV.]  PHILIP'S  WAR.  349 

shot  down  ;  other  provincial  troops,  now  pressing  up  with  una 
vailing  succour,  defeated  the  Indians  and  put  them  to  flight. 
But,  more  elated  with  their  first  success  than  daunted  by  their 
final  check,  these  savages  speedily  reappeared  before  the  village 
and  shook  the  scalps  and  bloody  garments  of  the  slaughtered 
captain  and  his  troop  before  the  eyes  of  the  inhabitants.  Deer- 
field  was  shortly  after  deserted  by  its  harassed  settlers,  and  de 
stroyed  by  the  triumphant  Indians.  It  is  a  truth  not  yet  suffi 
ciently  illustrated,  that,  in  all  the  Indian  wars  of  this  period,  the 
savages,  from  the  condition  of  the  country,  their  own  superior 
acquaintance  with  it,  and  their  peculiar  habits  of  life  and  qualities 
of  body  and  mind,  enjoyed  advantages  which  well-nigh  coun 
terbalanced  the  superiority  of  European  science.  They  seemed 
to  unite  the  instinct  and  ferocity  of  the  brutal  creation  with  the  art 
and  sagacity  of  rational  beings,  and  were,  in  single  combat  and 
in  the  conflict  of  very  small  numbers,  as  superior,  as  in  more  nu 
merous  encounter  they  were  inferior,  to  civilized  men.  Chang 
ing  their  own  encampments  with  facility,  and  advancing  upon 
those  of  the  colonists  with  the  wary,  dexterous  secrecy  of 
beasts  of  prey,  with  them  there  was  almost  always  the  spirit 
and  audacity  of  attack,  and  with  their  adversaries  the  disad 
vantages  of  defence  and  the  consternation  produced  by  sur 
prise  ;  nor  could  the  colonists  obtain  the  means  of  attacking, 
in  their  turn,  without  following  the  savages  into  forests  and 
swamps,  where  the  benefit  of  their  higher  martial  qualities  was 
lost,  and  the  system  of  European  warfare  rendered  impractica 
ble.  The  savages  had  long  been  acquainted  with  firearms, 
and  were  remarkably  expert  in  the  use  of  them. 

For  some  time  the  incursions  of  the  Indians  could  not  be 
restrained  ;  and  every  enterprise  or  skirmish  in  which  they 
reaped  the  slightest  credit  or  advantage  increased  the  number 
of  their  allies.  But  the  savage  artifice  which  Philip  employed 
on  one  occasion,  for  the  purpose  of  recruiting  his  forces,  re 
coiled  with  merited  injury  on  himself.  Repairing  with  a  band 
of  his  adherents  to  the  territory  of  a  neutral  tribe,  he  caused 
certain  of  the  people  who  belonged  to  it  to  be  surprised  and 
assassinated  ;  and  then,  proceeding  to  the  head-quarters  of  the 
tribe,  he  affirmed  that  he  had  seen  the  murder  committed  by  a 
party  of  the  Plymouth  soldiers.  The  tribe,  in  a  flame  of  rage, 


350  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

declared  war  on  the  colonists  ;  but  their  vindictive  sentiments 
soon  took  another  direction  ;  for  one  of  the  wounded  men, 
having  recovered  his  senses,  made  a  shift  to  crawl  to  the  hab 
itations  of  his  countrymen,  and,  though  mortally  injured,  was 
able,  before  he  expired,  to  disclose  the  real  author  of  the  trag 
edy.  Revoking  their  former  purpose,  the  tribe  thereupon  de 
clared  war  on  Philip,  and  espoused  the  cause  of  his  enemies. 
Hostilities  were  protracted  till  near  the  close  of  the  following 
year,  when  the  steady  efforts  and  determined  'courage  of  the 
colonists  prevailed  ;  and,  after  a  series  of  defeats,  and  the  loss 
of  all  his  family  and  chief  counsellors,  Philip  himself  was  killed 
by  one  of  his  own  tribe  whom  he  had  offended.  [Aug.  1676.] 
Deprived  of  its  chief  abettor,  the  war  was  soon  terminated  by 
the  submission  of  the  Indians.  Yet  to  certain  of  the  tribes 
the  colonists  sternly  denied  all  terms  of  capitulation,  and 
warned  them,  before  their  surrender,  that  their  treachery  had 
been  so  gross  and  unprovoked,  and  their  outrages  so  atrocious 
and  unpardonable,  that  they  must  abide  the  issue  of  judicial 
arbitrament.  In  conformity  with  this  declaration,  some  of  the 
chiefs  were  tried  and  executed  for  murder  ;  and  a  number  of 
their  followers  were  transported  to  the  West  Indies,  and  sold 
as  slaves.  Never  before  had  the  people  of  New  England  been 
engaged  in  hostilities  so  fierce,  so  bloody,  or  so  desolating. 
Many  houses  and  flourishing  villages  were  reduced  to  ashes  ; 
and  in  the  course  of  the  warfare,  six  hundred  persons  of  Euro 
pean  birth  or  descent,  composing  the  flower  and  strength  of 
several  of  the  districts,  either  fell  in  battle,  were  massacred  in 
their  dwellings,  or  expired  beneath  the  tortures  inflicted  by  the 
savages  on  their  captives.  The  military  operations  of  the 
colonists  in  these  campaigns  were  thought,  and  perhaps  justly, 
to  disclose  less  skill  and  conduct  than  had  been  displayed  in 
the  Pequod  War.  They  were,  indeed,  no  longer  commanded 
by  the  experienced  officers  who  accompanied  their  ancestors 
from  Europe  ;  and  they  were  opposed  to  an  enemy  much  more 
formidable  than  the  Pequods.  But  the  firm,  enduring  valor 
they  manifested  was  worthy  of  men  whose  characters  were 
formed  under  institutions  no  less  favorable  to  freedom  than 
virtue,  and  who  fought  in  defence  of  all  they  held  dear  and 
valuable.  Among  other  officers,  Captain  Church,  of  Massa- 


CHAP.  IV.]   WAR  WITH  THE  EASTERN  INDIANS.      351 

chusetts,  and  Captain  Denison,  of  Connecticut,  have  been  par 
ticularly  celebrated  by  the  provincial  historians  for  their  heroic 
ardor  and  fortitude.  In  the  commencement  of  the  war,  the 
surprising  treachery  practised  by  the  hostile  Indians  naturally 
excited  apprehensions  of  the  defection  of  the  Indian  congrega 
tions  which  the  missionaries  had  collected  and  partly  civilized. 
But  not  one  of  these  people  proved  unfaithful  to  their  bene 
factors.1 

The  Indian  warfare  by  which  New  England  was  desolated 
during  this  period  was  not  bounded  by  the  hostilities  of  Philip 
and  his  confederates.  An  attack  was  made  at  the  same  time 
on  New  Hampshire  and  Maine,  by  the  tribes  that  were  situated 
in  the  vicinity  of  these  settlements.  The  Indians  complained 
that  they  had  been  defrauded  and  insulted  by  some  of  the 
English  traders  in  that  quarter  ; 2  but  strong  suspicions  were 
entertained  that  their  hostilities  were  promoted  by  the  French 
government,  now  reestablished  in  Acadia.  The  invasion  of 
those  territories  was  distinguished  by  the  usual  guile,  ferocity, 
and  cruelty  of  the  savages.  Many  of  the  inhabitants  were 
massacred,  and  others  carried  into  captivity.  Prompt  assist 
ance  was  rendered  to  her  allies  by  Massachusetts  ;  and  after 
a  variety  of  sharp  engagements,  the  Indians  sustained  a  con 
siderable  defeat.  They  were,  notwithstanding,  still  able  and 
willing  to  continue  the  war  ;  and  both  their  numbers  and  their 
animosity  were  increased  by  a  measure  which  the  provincial 
government  adopted  against  them.  It  was  proposed  to  the 
General  Court  of  Massachusetts  to  invite  the  Mohawk  tribe, 
who,  from  time  immemorial,  had  been  the  enemies  of  the 
Eastern  Indians,  to  make  a  descent  on  their  territories  at  this 

1  Mather.     Neal.     Hutchinson.     See  Note  XII.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

8  One  of  these  complaints  was  occasioned  by  the  brutal  act  of  some  English 
sailors  in  overturning  an  Indian  canoe  in  which  they  observed  an  infant  child, 
in  order  to  ascertain  the  truth  of  a  story  they  had  heard,  that  swimming  was  as 
natural  to  a  young  Indian  as  to  a  young  duck.  The  child  died  in  consequence  of 
the  immersion  ;  and  its  father,  who  was  highly  respected  as  a  necromancer  by 
the  Indians,  became  the  inveterate  enemy  of  the  English.  Belknap.  An  ac 
tion  that  excited  still  greater  resentment  was  committed  by  Major  Waldron,  of 
New  Hampshire,  during  the  war.  He  had  made  a  treaty  of  friendship  with  a 
band  of  four  hundred  Indians ;  but  on  discovering  that  some  of  them  had 
served  in  Philip's  army,  he  laid  hold  of  these  by  a  stratagem  and  sent  them  as 
prisoners  to  Boston.  Theii  associates  never  forgave  this  breach  of  compact ; 
and  thirteen  years  after,  a  party  of  them,  having  surprised  the  major  in  his 
house  by  a  stratagem  still  more  artful  than  his  own,  put  him  to  death  by  the 
most  horrible  inflictions  of  cruelty.  Ibid. 


HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

juncture.  The  lawfulness  of  using  such  auxiliaries  was  ques 
tioned  by  some ;  but  it  was  deemed  a  satisfactory  answer  to  the 
objection,  that  Abraham  confederated  with  the  Amorites  for 
the  rescue  of  his  kinsman,  Lot,  from  the  hands  of  a  common 
enemy ; l  and  messengers  were  accordingly  despatched  to 
solicit  the  cooperation  of  the  Mohawks.  Little  entreaty  was 
necessary  to  induce  them  to  comply  with  the  invitation  ;  and  a 
band  of  Mohawk  warriors  quickly  marched  against  their  he 
reditary  foes.  The  expedition,  however,  so  far  from  produc 
ing  the  slightest  benefit,  was  attended  with  serious  disadvantage 
to  the  cause  of  the  colonists.  The  Indians  who  were  their 
proper  enemies  suffered  very  little  from  the  Mohawk  invasion  ; 
while  some  powerful  tribes,  who  had  been  hitherto  at  peace 
with  the  colonists,  exasperated  by  injuries  or  affronts  which 
they  received  from  those  invaders,  now  declared  war  both 
against  them  and  their  English  allies.  At  last,  the  intelligence 
of  Philip's  overthrow,  and  the  probability  of  stronger  forces 
being  thus  enabled  to  march  against  them,  inclined  the  Eastern 
Indians  to  hearken  to  proposals  of  peace.  The  war  in  this 
quarter  was  terminated  by  a  treaty  favorable  to  the  Indians,  to 
whom  the  colonists  engaged  to  pay  a  certain  quantity  of  corn 
yearly  as  a  quitrent  for  their  lands.2 

Although  the  neighbouring  province  of  New  York  was  now 
a  British  settlement,  no  assistance  was  obtained  from  it  by  the 
New  England  States  in  their  long  and  obstinate  conflict  with 
the  Indians.  On  the  contrary,  a  hostile  demonstration  from 
that  quarter  augmented  the  distress  .  and  inquietude  of  the  In 
dian  war.  Andros,  who  was  then  governor  of  the  newly  ac 
quired  province,  having  claimed  for  the  Duke  of  York  a  con 
siderable  tract  of  land  which  in  reality  formed  part  of  the 
Connecticut  territory,  asserted  the  denied  pretension  of  his 
master  by  advancing  with  an  armament  against  the  town  and 
fort  of  Saybrook,  which  he  summoned  to  surrender.  The 
inhabitants,  though  at  first  alarmed  to  behold  the  English  flag 
unfurled  against  them,  speedily  recovered  from  their  surprise  ; 

1  Francis  the  Second,  of  France,  had  previously  employed  the  same  defen 
sive  argument  in  the  proclamation  by  which  he  apologized  for  his  alliance 
with  the  Turks.  —  Millot. 

8    Neal.     Hutchinson.     Belknap. 


CHAP.  IV.]  RENEWAL  OF  DISPUTES  WITH  THE  CROWN.   353 

and  hoisting  the  same  flag  on  their  walls,  prepared  to  defend 
themselves  against  the  assailants.  Andros,  who  had  not  an 
ticipated  such  resolute  opposition,  hesitated  to  fire  upon  the 
English  flag ;  and  learning  that  Captain  Bull,  an  officer  of 
distinguished  bravery  and  determination,  had  marched  with  a 
party  of  the  Connecticut  militia  for  the  defence  of  the  place, 
judged  it  expedient  to  abandon  his  enterprise  and  return  to 
New  York.1 

The  cessation  of  the  Indian  hostilities  was  not  attended  with 
a  restoration  of  the  happiness  and  tranquillity  which  they  inter 
rupted.  The  king  had  now  matured  the  scheme  of  arbitrary 
government  which  he  steadily  pursued  during  the  remainder 
of  his  inglorious  reign  ;  and  the  colonists,  while  yet  afflicted 
with  the  smart  of  their  recent  calamities,  were  forced  to  re 
sume  their  ancient  controversies  with  the  crown,  which  they 
had  vainly  hoped  were  forgotten  or  abandoned  by  the  English 
government.2  Instead  of  approbation  for  the  bravery  and  the 
manly  reliance  on  their  own  resources  with  which  they  had 
conducted  their  military  operations,  and  repelled  hostilities 
partly  occasioned  by  the  disregard  of  their  interests  exempli 
fied  by  the  mother  country  in  restoring  Acadia  to  the  French, 
— they  found  themselves  overwhelmed  with  reproaches  for  a 
haughty,  factious  obstinacy  in  refusing  to  solicit  assistance  from 
the  king,  and  a  sordid  parsimony  in  the  equipment  of  their 
levies,  which  (the  British  court  declared)  had  caused  the  war 
to  be  so  greatly  protracted,  and  showed  them  utterly  unfit  to 
be  longer  intrusted  with  the  government  of  a  country  in  which 
their  sovereign  possessed  so  large  a  stake.3  Indications  of  the 
revival  of  royal  dislike,  and  of  the  resumption  of  the  king's 
former  designs,  had  occurred  before  the  conclusion  of  the  war 
with  Philip.  While  hostilities  were  still  raging  in  the  province, 
the  government  of  Massachusetts  found  it  necessary  to  direct 
a  part  of  its  attention  to  the  claims  of  Mason  and  Gorges 
with  respect  to  New  Hampshire  and  Maine.  In  the  summer 
of  1676,  Randolph,  a  messenger  despatched  by  the  king, 

1  Trumbull.  2  See  Note  XIII.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

3  "  You  are  poor,  and  yet  proud,"  said  Lord  Anglesey,  one  of  the  king's 
ministers,  in  a  letter  to  the  domestic  authorities  of  Massachusetts,  "  and  you 
wish  to  be  independent  of  the  king's  protection." 

VOL.   i.  45 


354  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

announced  to  the  General  Court  that  a  judgment  would  be 
pronounced  by  his  Majesty  in  council  against  their  pretensions, 
unless,  within  six  months,  deputies  were  sent  to  plead  in  their 
behalf ;  and  as  letters  were  received  at  the  same  time  from  the 
friends  of  the  colonists  in  England,  giving  assurance  that  the 
king  was  determined  to  fulfil  his  threat,  and  that  any  apparent 
contumacy  or  procrastination  on  the  part  of  the  provincial  gov 
ernment  would  but  accelerate  the  execution  of  more  formidable 
designs  on  which  the  English  court  was  deliberating,  the  royal 
message  received  immediate  attention,  and  Stoughton  and 
Bulkeley  were  despatched  as  deputies  to  represent  and  sup 
port  the  interests  of  Massachusetts.1 

The  respective  titles  and  claims  of  the  parties  having  been 
submitted  to  the  consideration  of  the  two  chief  justices  of 
England,  the  legal  merits  of  the  question  were  speedily  extri 
cated  by  their  practised  intelligence  from  the  confused  mass  of 
inconsistent  grants  in  which  they  had  been  enveloped.  [1677.] 
It  was  adjudged  that  municipal  jurisdiction  in  New  Hampshire 
was  incapable  of  being  validly  conveyed  by  the  Council  of 
Plymouth,  and  therefore  reverted  to  the  crown  in  consequence 
of  the  dissolution  of  the  Council,  with  reservation,  however, 
of  Mason's  claims  on  the  property  of  the  soil,  —  a  reservation 
which  for  many  years  rendered  all  property  in  New  Hamp 
shire  insecure,  and  involved  the  inhabitants  in  continual  in 
quietude,  dispute,  and  litigation.  As  Gorges,  in  addition  to 
his  original  grant  from  the  Plymouth  Council,  had  procured  a 
royal  patent  for  the  province  of  Maine,  the  entire  property, 
both  seigniorial  and  territorial,  of  this  province  was  adjudged  to 
be  vested  in  him.  In  consequence  of  this  decision,  the  juris 
diction  of  Massachusetts  over  New  Hampshire  ceased  ;  but  it 
was  preserved  in  the  province  of  Maine  by  an  arrangement 
with  the  successful  claimant.  The  king  had  been  for  some 
time  in  treaty  for  the  purchase  of  Maine,  which  he  designed 
to  unite  with  New  Hampshire,  and  to  bestow  on  his  natural 
son,  the  Duke  of  Monmouth  ;  but,  straitened  for  money,  and 
expecting  no  competitor  in  the  purchase,  he  deferred  the  com 
pletion  of  the  contract.  The  government  of  Massachusetts, 

1  Hutchinson. 


CHA?.  IV.]    ROYAL   GOVERNOR  OF  NEW  HAMPSHIRE.       355 

aware  of  this,  and  urgently  solicited  by  the  inhabitants  of  Maine 
to  prevent  their  territories  from  being  severed  from  its  juris 
diction,  proposed  to  Gorges  an  immediate  purchase  of  his 
rights,  which  he  readily  consented  to  sell  for  twelve  hundred 
pounds.  This  transaction  gave  much  offence  to  the  king,  who 
peremptorily  insisted  that  the  authorities  of  Massachusetts 
should  waive  their  title  and  relinquish  the  acquisition  to  him  ; 
but  they  firmly  declined  to  gratify  him  by  such  compliance, 
and  maintained  that  their  conduct  needed  no  other  justification 
than  its  conformity  to  the  wishes  of  the  people  of  Maine. 

The  inhabitants  of  New  Hampshire  were  no  less  reluctant 
to  be  separated  from  Massachusetts  ;  but  they  were  compelled 
to  submit,  and  to  receive  a  royal  governor.1  [1677.]  One  of 
the  first  acts  of  their  legislature  was  to  vote  a  grateful  address 
to  Massachusetts,  acknowledging  the  former  kindness  of  this 
colony,  and  protesting  that  only  the  commands  of  the  king  now 
interrupted  a  connection  which  it  had  been  their  anxious  desire 
to  preserve.  The  government  thus  forced  upon  them  proved 
incapable  of  preserving  tranquillity  or  commanding  respect. 
The  attempts  that  were  made  to  enforce  Mason's  title  to  the 
property  of  the  soil,  and  to  render  the  inhabitants  tributary  to 
him  for  the  possessions  which  they  had  purchased  from  others 
and  improved  by  their  own  labor,  excited  violent  ferments,  and 
resulted  in  a  train  of  vexatious,  but  indecisive,  legal  warfare.2 
Cranfield,  the  governor,  after  involving  himself  in  controver 
sies  and  altercations  with  the  planters  and  their  legislative  as 
sembly,  in  which  he  was  continually  foiled,  transmitted  an  as 
surance  to  the  British  government,  "  that,  while  the  clergy 
were  allowed  to  preach,  no  true  allegiance  could  be  found  in 
those  parts."  He  wreaked  his  vengeance  upon  some  Non-con 
formist  ministers,  to  whose  eloquence  he  imputed  the  stiff,  un- 

1  In  the  first  commission  that  was  issued  for  the  government  of  this  prov 
ince,  the  king  engaged  to  continue  to  the  people  their  ancient  privilege  of 
an   assembly,  "  unless,  by  inconvenience  arising  therefrom,  he  or  his  heirs 
should  see  cause  to  alter  the  same."  —  Belknap. 

2  The  people  were  sometimes  provoked  to  oppose  what  they  termed  swamp 
law  to  parchment  law.     An  irregular  judgment  having   been   pronounced  in 
favor  of  Mason,  against  some  persons  who  refused  to  submit  to  it,  the  gover 
nor  sent  a  party  of  sheriff's  officers  to  serve  a  writ  on  them  while  they  were 
in   church.     The   congregation  was  incensed  at  this   proceeding;   a  young 
woman  knocked  down  a  sheriff's  officer  with  her  Bible  ;  and  the  conflict  be 
coming  general,  the  whole  legal  army  was  routed.     It  was  found  necessary  to 
abandon  the  judgment.  —  Belknap. 


356  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BO<$K  II. 

bending  spirit  of  the  people,  and  whose  general  denunciations 
against  vice  he  construed  into  personal  reflections  on  himself 
and  his  favorites,  by  arbitrarily  commanding  them  to  adminis 
ter  the  sacrament  to  him  according  to  the  liturgy  of  the  church 
of  England,  and  committing  them  to  prison  on  receiving  the 
refusal  which  he  expected.  His  misgovernment  at  length  pro 
voked  a  few  rash^  individuals,  hastily  and  without  concert,  to 
revolt  against  his  authority.  The  insurrection  was  suppressed 
without  the  slightest  difficulty  ;  and  the  insurgents,  having  been 
arraigned  of  high  treason,  were  convicted  and  condemned  to 
die.  But  Cranfield,  conscious  of  the  unpopularity  of  his  gov 
ernment,  had  exercised  an  unfair  and  illegal  control  in  the  se 
lection  of  the  jury,  which  excited  universal  indignation  ;  and 
afraid  to  carry  his  sentence  into  effect  within  the  colony,  he 
adopted  the  strange  and  unwarrantable  proceeding  of  sending 
the  prisoners  to  be  executed  in  England.  The  English  gov 
ernment  actually  sanctioned  this  irregularity,  and  were  pre 
paring  to  obey  the  sentence  of  a  provincial  magistrate,  and  to 
exhibit  to  the  people  of  England  the  tragical  issue  of  a  trial, 
with  the  merits  of  which  they  were  totally  unacquainted,  when 
a  pardon  was  obtained  for  the  unfortunate  persons,  by  the  so 
licitation  of  Cranfield  himself,  who,  finding  it  impracticable  to 
maintain  order  in  the  province,  or  to  withstand  the  numerous 
complaints  of  his  injustice  and  oppression,  had  solicited  his 
own  recall.  Shortly  after  his  departure,  New  Hampshire 
spontaneously  reverted  to  the  jurisdiction  of  Massachusetts, 
and  shared  her  fortunes  till  the  period  of  the  British  Revolu 
tion.1 

Although  the  troubles  of  the  Popish  Plot  began  now  to 
engage  and  perplex  the  mind  of  the  king  [1678],  he  was  no 
longer  to  be  diverted  from  his  purpose  of  attempting  the  sub 
jugation  of  Massachusetts  ;  and  though  the  concern  of  the 
Duke  of  Monmouth  with  that  celebrated  imposture,  and  the 
connections  he  formed  with  the  profligate  Shaftesbury  and  its 
other  promoters  or  patrons,  might  diminish  the  king's  regret  for 

1  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Belknap.  These  events,  and  the  particular  his 
tory  of  New  Hampshire  at  this  period,  are  related  in  considerable  detail,  with 
every  appearance  of  accuracy,  and  with  much  spirit,  good  sense,  and  liberali 
ty,  by  Dr.  Belknap.  It  is  to  this  author's  History  of  New  Hampshire  that  I 
refer,  wherever  his  American  Biography  (the  very  inappropriate  title  of  a  val 
uable  work)  is  not  expressly  mentioned. 


CHAP."  IV.]     COMPLAINTS  AGAINST  MASSACHUSETTS.      357 

the  privation  of  the  appanage  which  he  had  meant  to  bestow 
on  him,  yet  the  presumptuous  interference  of  Massachusetts 
to  defeat  this  design  inflamed  his  displeasure  and  fortified  his 
tyrannical  resolution.  That  additional  pretexts  might  not  be 
wanting  to  justify  his  measures,  every  complaint  that  could  be 
collected  against  the  colony  was  promoted  and  encouraged. 
The  Quakers,  who  refused,  during  the  Indian  war,  either  to 
perform  military  service  or  to  pay  the  fines  imposed  on  de 
faulters,  complained  bitterly  of  the  persecution  they  had  in 
curred  by  the  exaction  of  those  fines,  as  well  as  of  the  law 
which  obliged  them  to  contribute  to  the  maintenance  of  the 
provincial  clergy.  When  the  dangers  of  the  Indian  war  were 
at  their  height,  some  of  the  colonists,  interpreting  the  calamity 
as  a  judgment  of  Heaven  upon  the  land  for  harbouring  such 
heretics  as  the  Quakers  within  its  bosom,  procured  the  re- 
enactment  of  an  old  law  prohibiting  assemblies  for  Quaker 
worship  ;  and  though  it  does  not  appear  that  this  law  was  ex 
ecuted,  its  promulgation  was  justly  regarded  as  persecution, 
and  alienated  the  regards  of  many  persons  who  had  hitherto 
been  friends  of  the  colony.  The  agents,  deputed  to  defend 
the  interests  of  Massachusetts  in  the  controversies  respecting 
New  Hampshire  and  Maine,  were  detained  to  answer  the  com 
plaints  of  the  Quakers,  —  gravely  preferred  by  these  sectaries 
to  a  government  which  was  itself  administering  with  far  greater 
rigor  upon  them  the  very  policy  which  it  now  encouraged  them 
to  impute  to  one  of  its  own  provincial  dependencies  as  the 
most  scandalous  cruelty  and  injustice. 

Other  and  more  serious  imputations  contributed  to  detain 
the  agents  and  increase  their  perplexity.  Randolph,  who  was 
distinguished  by  a  stanch  and  sagacious  activity  in  support  of 
the  views  and  interests  of  arbitrary  power,  and  whom  the 
people  of  New  England  described  as  "  going  up  and  down 
seeking  whom  he  might  devour,"  had  ably  and  diligently  ful 
filled  his  instructions  to  collect  as  much  matter  of  complaint  as 
he  could  obtain  within  the  colony  ;  and  loaded  with  the  hatred 
of  the  people,  which  he  cordially  reciprocated,  he  now  re 
turned  to  England  and  opened  his  budget  of  arraignment  and 
vituperation.  The  most  just  and  most  formidable  of  his  charges 
was,  that  the  Navigation  Act  was  entirely  disregarded,  and  a 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

free  trade  pursued  by  the  colonists  with  all  parts  of  the  world. 
This  was  a  charge  which  the  provincial  agents  could  neither 
deny  nor  extenuate  ;  and  they  anxiously  pressed  their  constitu 
ents  to  put  an  end  to  the  occasion  of  it.  Any  measures  which 
the  king  might  adopt,  either  for  promoting  the  future  efficacy 
of  the  Navigation  Acts,  or  for  punishing  the  past  neglect  which 
they  had  experienced,  were  the  more  likely  to  coincide  with 
the  sentiments  of  the  English  people,  from  the  interest  which 
a  considerable  portion  of  the  mercantile  class  of  their  country 
men  enjoyed  in  the  monopoly  which  it  was  the  object  of  those 
laws  to  secure.  A  petition  was  presented  to  the  king  and 
privy  council  by  a  number  of  English  merchants  and  manu 
facturers,  complaining  of  the  disregard  of  the  Navigation  Acts 
in  New  England,  and  praying  that  they  might  hereafter  be 
vigorously  executed,  for  the  sake  of  promoting  the  commerce 
of  the  parent  state,  as  well  as  of  preserving  her  dominion  over 
her  colonies.  That  a  stronger  impression  might  be  made  on 
the  public  mind,  the  petitioners  were  solemnly  heard  in  pres 
ence  of  the  privy  council,  and  indulged  with  the  amplest  lati 
tude  of  pleading  in  support  of  their  commercial  complaints  and 
political  views. 

The  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  [1679],  alarmed  by 
these  measures,  intimated,  by  letter  to  their  agents,  that  "  they 
apprehended  the  Navigation  Acts  to  be  an  invasion  of  the 
rights,  liberties,  and  properties  of  the  subjects  of  his  Majesty 
in  the  colony  ;  —  they  not  being  represented  in  parliament ; 
and,  according  to  the  usual  sayings  of  the  learned  in  the  law, 
the  laws  of  England  being  bounded  within  the  four  seas,  and 
not  reaching  to  America."  They  added,  however,  that,  "  as 
his  Majesty  had  signified  his  pleasure  that  those  acts  should 
be  observed  in  Massachusetts,  they  had  made  provision,  by  a 
law  of  the  colony,  that  they  should  be  strictly  attended  to  from 
time  to  time,  although  it  greatly  discouraged  trade,  and  was  a 
great  damage  to  his  Majesty's  plantation."  These  expressions, 
and  the  recent  provincial  law  to  which  they  refer,  demonstrate 
the  peculiar  views  which  were  entertained  by  the  people  of 
Massachusetts  of  the  connection  that  subsisted  between  them 
selves  and  the  parent  state.  Their  pretensions  were  the  same 
with  those  which  a  few  years  after  were  advanced  by  the 


CHAP.   IV.]     MASSACHUSETTS  URGED  TO  SUBMIT.  359 

people  of  Ireland  ;  —  that,  although  dependent  on  the  crown, 
and  obliged  to  conform  their  jurisprudence,  as  far  as  possible, 
to  the  law  of  England,  the  statutes  of  the  English  parliament 
did  not  operate  within  their  territory,  till  reenacted,  or  other 
wise  recognized,  by  their  own  domestic  legislature.  So  fully 
did  this  notion  possess  the  minds  of  the  people  of  New  Eng 
land,  and  so  obstinately  did  their  interests  resist  the  execution 
of  the  commercial  regulations,  that  even  the  submissive  prov 
ince  of  Rhode  Island,  although,  about  this  time,  in  imitation 
of  Massachusetts,  it  took  some  steps  towards  a  conformity  with 
these  regulations,  never  expressly  recognized  them  till  the  year 
1700,  when  its  legislature  empowered  the  governor  "  to  put 
the  Acts  of  Navigation  in  execution."  1 

The  provincial  agents,  aware  of  the  strong  interests  that 
prompted  their  countrymen  still  to  overstep  the  boundaries  of 
their  regulated  trade,  furnished  them  with  correct  information 
of  the  threatening  aspect  of  their  affairs  in  England,  and  as 
sured  them  that  only  an  entire  compliance  with  the  Navigation 
Acts  could  shelter  them  from  the  impending  storm  of  royal  ven 
geance  and  tyranny.  These  honest  representations  produced 
the  too  frequent  effect  of  unwelcome  truths  ;  they  diminished 
the  popularity  of  the  agents,  and  excited  suspicions  in  Boston 
that  they  had  not  advocated  the  interests  of  the  colony  with 
sufficient  zeal.  The  people  were  always  too  apt  to  suspect 
that  their  deputies  in  England  were  overawed  by  the  pomp 
and  infected  with  the  subservience  that  prevailed  at  the  royal 
court  ;  and  they  neglected  to  make  due  allowance  for  the 
different  aspect  which  a  dispute  with  England  presented  to 
men  who  beheld  face  to  face  her  vast  establishments  and  su 
perior  power,  and  to  others  who  speculated  on  the  probability 
of  such  dispute  at  the  opposite  extremity  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 
At  last  the  agents  obtained  leave  to  return  ;  and  though  some 
impatience  and  ill-humor  had  been  excited  by  their  fidelity  in 
the  discharge  of  a  disagreeable  duty,  the  deliberate  sentiments 
of  their  countrymen  were  so  little  perverted,  that,  when  the 
king  again  intimated  his  desire  of  the  reappointment  of  agents 
in  England,  the  colonists  twice  again  elected  the  same  indi- 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


360  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

viduals  to  their  former  office,  —  which,  however,  these  per 
sons  could  never  again  be  persuaded  to  undertake.  They 
carried  back  with  them  to  America  a  letter  containing  the 
requisitions  of  the  king,  of  which  the  most  material  were,  that 
the  formula  of  the  oath  of  allegiance  should  be  rendered  more 
explicit,  and  should  be  subscribed  by  every  person  holding  an 
office  of  public  trust  in  New  England  ;  that  all  civil  and  mili 
tary  commissions  should  be  issued  in  the  king's  name  ;  and  all 
laws  repugnant  to  the  English  commercial  statutes  abolished. 
The  General  Court,  eagerly  indulging  the  hope,  that,  by  a 
compliance  with  these  moderate  demands,  they  could  appease 
their  sovereign  and  avert  his  displeasure,  made  haste  to  enact 
laws  in  conformity  with  his  requisitions.  They  trusted  that  he 
had  now  abandoned  the  designs  which  they  had  been  taught  to 
apprehend  ;  and  which,  in  reality,  were  merely  suspended  by 
the  influence  of  the  proceedings  connected  with  the  Popish 
Plot,  and  with  the  parliamentary  bill  that  was  in  agitation  for 
excluding  the  Duke  of  York  from  the  throne. 

Although  the  requisitions  which  the  king  transmitted  by  the 
hands  of  Stoughton  and  Bulkeley  were  obeyed,  he  continued  to 
intimate,  from  time  to  time,  his  desire  that  new  agents  might 
be  appointed  to  represent  the  colony  in  London  ;  but  partly 
from  the  apprehensive  jealousy  with  which  the  colonists  re 
garded  such  a  measure,  and  partly  from  the  reluctance  that 
prevailed  among  their  political  leaders  to  undertake  so  arduous 
and  delicate  an  employment,  the  king's  desires  on  this  point 
were  not  complied  with.  The  short  interval  of  independence 
which  the  colonists  were  yet  permitted  to  enjoy  was  very  remote 
from  a  state  of  tranquillity.  Randolph,  who  had  commended 
himself  to  the  king  and  his  ministers  by  the  adroit  and  active 
prosecution  of  their  views,  was  appointed  collector  of  the  cus 
toms  at  Boston  ;  and  a  custom-house  establishment,  which  some 
years  before  had  been  erected  without  opposition  in  Virginia  and 
Maryland,  was  now  extended  to  New  England.1  But  it  was  in 
Massachusetts  that  this  measure  was  intended  to  produce  the 

1  As  a  measure,  partly  of  terror,  and  partly  of  punishment,  it  was  determined 
by  the  English  privy  council,  about  this  time,  "  that  no  Mediterranean  passes 
shall  be  granted  to  New  England,  to  protect  its  vessels  against  the  Turks,  till 
it  is  seen  what  dependence  it  will  acknowledge  on  his  Majesty,  or  whether 
his  custom-house  officers  are  received  as  in  other  colonies."  —  Chalmers. 


CHAP.  IV.]  PARTIES  IN  MASSACHUSETTS.  361 

effects  which  it  was  easily  foreseen  would  result  from  its  own 
nature,  as  well  as  from  the  temper  and  unpopularity  of  the  per 
son  who  was  appointed  to  conduct  it.  The  Navigation  Acts 
were  evaded  in  Rhode  Island,  and  openly  contemned  and 
violated  in  Connecticut ;  yet  these  States  were  permitted  to 
practise  such  irregularities  without  reprehension.  It  was  less 
the  execution  of  the  commercial  statutes  themselves  that  the 
king  desired,  than  the  advantage  which  would  accrue  from  an  at 
tempt  to  enforce  them,  after  such  long  neglect,  in  the  obnoxious 
province  of  Massachusetts.  To  this  province  he  confined  his 
attention,  and  justly  considered  that  the  issue  of  a  contest 
with  it  would  necessarily  involve  the  fate  of  all  the  other  set 
tlements  in  New  England.  Randolph  exercised  his  functions 
with  the  most  offensive  rigor,  and  very  soon  complained  that 
the  stubbornness  of  the  people  defeated  all  his  efforts,  and  pre 
sented  insuperable  obstacles  to  the  execution  of  the  laws. 
Almost  every  suit  that  he  instituted  for  the  recovery  of  penal 
ties  or  forfeitures  issued  in  a  judicial  sentence  against  himself. 
He  repaired  to  England  in  order  to  lay  his  complaints  before  his 
employers  [1680],  and  returned  invested  with  more  extensive 
powers,  in  the  exercise  of  which  he  was  not  more  successful. 
He  reproached  the  provincial  authorities  with  injustice  and 
partiality  ;  while  they  denied  the  charge,  and  taxed  him  with 
superfluous,  unnecessary,  and  vexatious  litigation. 

The  requisitions  and  remonstrances  which  the  king  continued 
to  address  to  the  General  Court,  from  time  to  time,  were  an 
swered  by  professions  of  loyalty  and  by  partial  compliances  ; 
but  on  one  point  the  colonists  were  determined,  either  entirely 
or  as  long  as  possible,  to  evade  the  royal  will ;  and  though 
repeatedly  directed,  they  still  delayed,  to  send  deputies  to 
England.  The  General  Court  was  at  this  time  divided  be 
tween  two  parties,  who  cordially  agreed  in  the  esteem  and 
attachment  by  which  they  were  wedded  to  their  chartered 
privileges,  but  differed  in  opinion  as  to  the  extent  to  which  it 
was  expedient  to  contend  for  them.  Bradstreet,  the  governor, 
at  the  head  of  the  moderate  party,  promoted  every  compliance 
with  the  will  of  the  parent  state  short  of  a  total  surrender  of 
the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  constitution  of  Massachusetts.  Dan- 
forth,  the  deputy-governor,  at  the  head  of  another  party, 

VOL.   i.  46     ... 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

obstructed  the  appointment  of  deputies,  and  opposed  all  sub 
mission  to  the  acts  of  trade  ;  maintaining  that  the  colonists 
should  adhere  to  the  strict  construction  of  their  charter,  resist 
every  abridgment  of  it  as  a  dangerous  precedent  no  less  than 
an  injurious  aggression,  and,  standing  firm  in  defence  of  their 
utmost  right,  commit  the  event  to  Divine  Providence.  These 
parties  conducted  their  debates  with  warmth,  but  without 
acrimony ;  and  as  the  sentiments  of  one  or  other  alternately 
prevailed,  a  greater  or  lesser  degree  of  compliance  with  the  de 
mands  of  the  king  was  infused  into  the  undecided  policy  of  the 
General  Court.1 

The  scene  of  trouble  and  misfortune  in  which  the  inhabitants 
of  this  quarter  of  America  had  for  a  series  of  years  been  in 
volved  could  not  fail  to  produce  a  grave  and  earnest  impression 
on  the  minds  of  men  habituated  to  regard  all  the  events  of  life 
in  a  religious  aspect,  and  contributed  to  revive  among  the 
descendants  of  the  original  planters  the  piety  for  which  New 
England  was  at  first  so  highly  distinguished.  A  short  time 
before  the  commencement  of  their  late  distresses,  a  natural 
phenomenon2  that  excited  much  awe  and  tribulation  at  the 
time,  and  was  long  pondered  with  earnest  and  solemn  remem 
brance,  was  visible  for  several  nights  successively  in  the 
heavens.  It  was  a  bright  meteor  in  the  form  of  a  spear,  of 
which  the  point  was  directed  towards  the  setting  sun,  —  and 
which,  with  slow,  majestic  motion,  descended  through  the  upper 
regions  of  the  air,  and  gradually  disappeared  beneath  the  horizon. 
This  splendid  phenomenon  produced  a  deep  and  general  im 
pression  on  the  minds  of  the  people  ;  and  the  magistrates, 
without  expressly  alluding  to  it,  acknowledged  and  endeavoured 
to  improve  its  influence  by  seizing  the  opportunity  to  promote 
a  general  reformation  of  manners.  Circular  letters  were  trans 
mitted  to  all  the  clergy,  urging  them  to  increased  diligence  in 
exemplifying  and  inculcating  the  precepts  of  religion,  especially 
on  the  young,  and  instructing  their  parishioners  from  house  to 

1  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  From  a  report  presented  this  year  (1680)  to 
the  Lords  of  Trade,  it  appears  that  Connecticut  then  contained  twenty-one 
churches,  each  of  which  had  its  minister ;  a  militia  of  twenty-five  hundred 
men  ;  a  very  few  indented  servants,  and  thirty  slaves.  Holmes. 

8  In  the  Journal  of  John  Evelyn  there  are  descriptions  of  the  occurrence  of 
similar  phenomena  in  England,  in  the  years  1643  and  1680. 


CHAP.  IV.]  PUBLIC  HUMILIATION.  363 

house.  The  dupes  of  science,  falsely  so  called,  may  deride 
these  impressions,  and  ascribe  to  ignorant  wonder  the  piety 
which  they  enkindled  ;  but  enlightened  philosophy  will  confess 
the  worth  and  dignity  of  that  principle  which  recognizes  in 
every  display  of  the  great  phenomena  of  nature  an  additional 
call  to  worship  and  glorify  its  Almighty  Creator,  and  which 
elevates  and  refines  human  faculties  by  placing  every  object 
that  forcibly  strikes  them  in  a  noble  and  graceful  light  derived 
from  connection  with  the  interests  of  morality  and  the  honor 
of  God.  The  events  of  the  Indian  war,  the  agricultural  losses 
that  were  occasioned  by  the  peculiar  inclemency  of  the  ensu 
ing  season,  and,  latterly,  the  disquiet  excited  by  the  contentions 
with  the  English  government,  served,  in  like  manner,  to  humble 
the  people  beneath  the  hand  of  that  Sovereign  Power  which 
controls  the  passions  of  men  as  well  as  the  elements  of  nature ; 
and  were  equally  productive  of  increased  diligence  in  the  cul 
tivation  of  piety  and  the  reformation  of  manners. 

Deeply  lamenting  the  moral  imperfections  and  deficiencies 
which  they  experienced  in  themselves  and  remarked  in  those 
around  them,  many  of  the  ministers,  magistrates,  and  principal 
inhabitants  of  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut  urgently  besought 
their  countrymen  to  consider  if  the  interruption  of  divine 
favor  did  not  betoken  disregard  of  the  divine  will  ;  and  by 
precept  and  example  labored  to  eradicate  every  evil  habit  or 
licentious  practice  that  a  state  of  war  and  an  influx  of  com 
mercial  wealth  were  supposed  to  have  produced  or  promoted. 
Men  were  strongly  exhorted  to  carry  a  continual  respect  to  the 
divine  will  into  the  minutest  ramifications  of  their  affairs,  and 
to  refine  and  sanctify  whatever  they  did  by  doing  it  to  the 
Lord.  The  General  Court  published  a  catalogue  of  the  epi 
demical  vices  of  the  times,  in  which  we  find  enumerated, 
neglect  of  the  education  of  children,  pride  displayed  in  the 
manner  of  cutting  and  curling  hair,  excess  of  finery,  immodesty 
of  apparel,  negligent  carriage  at  church,  failure  in  due  respect 
to  parents,  a  sordid  eagerness  of  shopkeepers  to  obtain  high 
prices,  profane  swearing,  idleness,  and  frequenting  of  taverns. 
Grand  juries  were  directed  to  present  (that  is  to  signalize  for 
trial  and  punishment)  all  offenders  in  these  respects  ;  but  either 
the  happier  influence  of  example  and  remonstrance  was  sufficient 


364  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

to  control  the  obnoxious  practices,  or  they  never  attained  such 
extent  of  prevalence  as  to  justify  the  infliction  of  legal  severi 
ties.1  In  many  instances,  the  scrupulous  piety  of  the  provin 
cial  magistrates  has  reprobated  existing  vices,  and  the  extent 
to  which  they  prevailed,  in  language  which  is  apt  to  beget 
misapprehension,  if  it  be  interpreted  in  conformity  with  the 
general  notions  and  tone  of  the  world  ;  and,  hence,  a  writer 
no  less  acute  than  Chalmers  has  fallen  into  the  gross  mistake 
of  deriving  a  charge  of  extraordinary  immorality  against  the 
inhabitants  of  Massachusetts  from  the  very  circumstances  that 
prove  the  strength  of  their  piety,  the  purity  of  their  moral 
habits,  and  the  still  higher  purity  of  their  moral  aspirations. 
The  strong  sense  that  religious  impressions  awaken  of  the 
depraved  propensities  inherent  in  human  nature  causes  the 
expression  of  the  moral  sentiments  of  truly  religious  men  to 
appear  to  the  world  at  large  as  the  ravings  of  hypocritical  cant 
or  fanatical  delusion.2 

The  king  had  never  lost  sight  of  his  purpose  of  remodelling 
the  constitution  of  Massachusetts  ;  although  some  appearance 
of  moderation  had  been  latterly  enforced  upon  him  by  the 
more  personal  and  pressing  concern  of  resisting  the  attempts 
of  Shaftesbury  to  reexemplify  the  deep  and  daring  policy  of 
the  Duke  of  Guise,  and  control  his  sovereign  by  the  formation 
and  supremacy  of  a  Protestant  league  in  England.  While 
Shaftesbury  and  his  party  were  able  to  retain  their  influence 
on  the  public  mind  by  the  artifice  of  the  Popish  Plot,  and  to 
attack  the  monarchy  by  the  device  of  the  exclusion  bill,  it  was 
probably  deemed  unsafe  to  signalize  the  royal  administration 
by  any  public  act  of  extraordinary  tyranny  in  a  province  so 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson.     Trumbull. 

2  After  this  manner  the  New  England  ministers  were  accustomed  to  ad 
dress  their  hearers.     "It  concerneth  New  England  always  to  remember  that 
they  are  originally  a  plantation  religious,  not  a  plantation  of  trade.     Let  mer 
chants,  and  such  as  are  increasing  cent,  per  cent.,  remember  this,  that  worldly 

?iin  was  not  the  end  and  design  of  the  people  of  New  England,  but  religion, 
nd  if  any  man  among  us  make  religion  as  twelve,  and  the  world  as  thirteen, 
such  an  one  hath  not  the  spirit  of  a  true  New-Englandman."  Higginson's 
Election  Sermon,  1663,  apud  Belknap.  Robert  Keayne,  a  colonist  of  great 
wealth,  piety,  talent,  and  consideration  in  Massachusetts,  and  a  liberal  bene 
factor  of  the  colony,  having  on  one  occasion  become  obnoxious  on  account  of 
the  "  corrupt  practice  "  of  selling  dearer  than  most  traders,  "  was,  for  this 
offence,  after  solemn  trial,  fined  two  hundred  pounds  by  the  General  Court, 
publicly  admonished  by  the  church,  and  hardly  escaped  excommunication." 
Q,uincy's  History  of  Harvard  University. 


CHAP.  IV.]    DEPUTIES  COMMANDED  TO  BE  SENT.  365 

distinguished  for  zeal  in  the  Protestant  cause  as  Massachusetts. 
But  Charles  had  now  obtained  a  complete  victory  over  his 
domestic  adversaries  [1681]  ;  and,  among  other  excesses  of 
retaliatory  violence  and  arbitrary  power  by  which  he  hastened 
to  improve  his  success,  he  instituted  writs  of  quo  warranto 
against  the  principal  corporations  in  England,  and  easily  ob 
tained  judgments  from  the  courts  of  law  that  declared  all  their 
liberties  and  franchises  forfeited  to  the  crown.  About  two 
years  before  this  period,  he  deliberated  on  the  possibility  of 
superseding  entirely  the  constitution  of  Massachusetts  without 
the  intermediate  recourse  of  any  legal  solemnity  ;  but,  on  con 
sulting  Jones  and  Winnington,  the  attorney  and  solicitor  gen 
eral,  he  learned  that  his  object  could  not  be  securely  or  effect 
ually  attained  except  by  the  instrumentality  of  a  writ  of  quo 
warranto^  which  at  that  time  it  was  not  deemed  expedient  to 
employ.  But  now  every  impediment  to  the  gratification  of  his 
wishes  was  removed  ;  and  the  colonists  received  such  intelli 
gence  from  their  friends  in  England  as  permitted  them  no 
longer  to  doubt  that  the  abrogation  of  their  charter  was  finally 
resolved  on  and  was  to  be  instantly  attempted.  Randolph, 
who  made  numerous  voyages  between  England  and  America, 
and  had  lately  affixed  a  protest  on  the  exchange  of  Boston 
against  the  legitimacy  of  the  provincial  government  and  its 
official  acts,  now  brought  from  London  a  letter  from  the  king, 
dated  the  26th  of  October,  1681,  recapitulating  all  the  com 
plaints  against  the  colony,  and  commanding  that  deputies  should 
instantly  be  sent  to  him,  not  only  to  answer  these  complaints, 
but  "  with  powers  to  submit  to  such  regulations  of  government 
as  his  Majesty  should  think  fit"  ;  which  if  the  colonists  failed 
to  do,  it  was  intimated  that  a  writ  of  quo  warranto  would  be 
directed  against  their  charter. 

A  new  criminatory  charge,  suggested  by  the  inquisitive 
hostility  of  Randolph,  was  at  the  same  time  preferred  against 
them,  —  that  they  coined  money  within  the  province,  in  con 
tempt  of  the  king's  prerogative.  The  General  Court,  in 
answer  to  this  sudden  arraignment  of  a  practice  which  had 
been  permitted  so  long  to  prevail  without  objection,  explained 
in  what  manner  and  at  what  time  it  originated,  and  appealed  to 
these  circumstances  as  decisively  proving  that  no  contempt  of 


366  HISTORY  OF  WORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

royal  authority  had  been  designed  ;  but  withal  declared,  that, 
if  it  were  regarded  as  a  trespass  on  his  Majesty's  prerogative, 
they  humbly  entreated  pardon  for  the  offence,  and  indulgence 
for  the  ignorance  under  which  it  was  committed.  Among  the 
other  complaints  that  were  urged  by  the  king,  were  the  pre 
sumptuous  purchase  of  the  province  of  Maine,  which  the  col 
onists  were  again  commanded  to  surrender,  and  the  disallow 
ance  of  religious  worship  except  on  the  model  of  the  Congre 
gational  churches  within  the  colony.  To  the  first  of  these 
they  answered  by  repeating  their  former  apology,  and  still 
declining  what  was  required  of  them  ;  and  to  the  second,  that 
liberty  of  worship  was  now  granted  to  all  denominations  of 
Christians  in  Massachusetts.  The  royal  letter  contained  many 
other  charges  ;  but  they  were  all  answered  by  solemn  protesta 
tions  that  either  the  commands  they  imported  were  already 
fulfilled,  or  the  disobedience  they  imputed  had  not  been  com 
mitted.  An  assembly  of  the  General  Court  having  been  held 
for  the  purpose  of  electing  deputies  to  represent  the  province 
in  England,  and  Stoughton  again  declining  to  accept  this  office, 
it  was  conferred  on  Dudley  and  Richards,  two  of  the  wealthi 
est  and  most  respectable  citizens  of  Massachusetts.  But  as 
the  plenary  powers  which  the  royal  letter  required  that  they 
should  be  invested  with,  of  acceding  to  whatever  regulations 
of  government  the  king  might  think  fit  to  propose,  were  nothing 
else  than  powers  to  surrender  all  the  rights  of  their  country 
men,  the  Court  was  careful  to  grant  no  such  authority,  and,  on 
the  contrary,  plainly  expressed  in  their  instructions  that  the 
deputies  were  not  to  do  or  consent  to  any  thing  that  should 
infringe  the  liberties  bestowed  by  the  charter,  or  infer  the 
slightest  alteration  of  the  existing  form  of  government. 

The  deputies  set  sail  for  England,  whither  they  were  soon 
followed  by  Randolph,  eager  to  confront  them  and  counteract 
their  exertions.1  A  public  fast  was  appointed  to  be  observed 

1  To  such  a  degree  had  Randolph  excited  the  jealousy  and  abhorrence 
of  the  colonists,  that  a  great  fire  happening  on  one  occasion  to  break  out  in 
Boston,  soon  after  his  arrival  in  the  city,  he  was  generally  believed  by  the 
populace  to  have  been  the  author  of  it  (Hutchinson)  ;  and  so  conscious  was 
he  of  the  provocation  he  had  given  to  popular  vengeance,  that  he  expressed 
his  apprehensions  to  the  British  ministers,  that  the  people  of  Massachusetts 
would  account  him  guilty  of  treason,  and  punish  him  witn  death,  for  attempt 
ing  to  subvert  their  politicaf  constitution.  Holmes. 


CHAP.  IV.]         CRANFIELD  ADVISES   BRIBERY.  367 

throughout  the  province  ;  and  prayers  were  addressed  to 
Heaven  for  the  preservation  of  the  charter  and  the  success  of 
the  deputation.  Means  less  pure,  though  certainly  not  unjusti 
fiable,  were  adopted,  or  at  least  sanctioned,  by  the  provincial 
council  or  board  of  assistants,  for  promoting  at  the  English 
court  the  wishes  and  interests  of  their  countrymen.  Cranfield, 
the  late  royal  governor  of  New  Hampshire,  happening  to  visit 
Boston  at  this  juncture,  suggested  to  those  authorities  that  the 
provincial  deputies  should  be  directed  to  wait  on  Lord  Hyde, 
and  tender  the  sum  of  two  thousand  guineas  for  the  private 
service  of  the  king,  which  he  assured  them,  from  the  notorious 
poverty  and  venality  of  the  court,  would  infallibly  procure  a 
suspension  of  all  hostile  proceedings.  Novices  in  craft,  they 
fell  headlong  into  the  snare,  and  addressed  letters  to  this  effect 
to  the  deputies,  while  Cranfield  despatched  letters  at  the  same 
time  to  the  king,  which  he  represented  to  them  as  containing 
the  strongest  recommendations  of  their  cause  to  royal  favor. 
But  though  these  men  were  willing,  in  a  cause  where  no  in 
terests  except  their  own  were  involved,  to  sacrifice  their 
money  for  their  liberty,  and  to  buy  their  country  out  of  the 
hands  of  a  sordid  and  dissolute  tyrant,  —  it  was  not  the  will  of 
Providence  that  the  liberties  of  Massachusetts  should  be 
bartered  for  gold,  or  that  devotional  prayers  associated  with 
such  unholy  exertions  should  prevail.  Letters  soon  arrived 
from  the  deputies,  informing  their  constituents  that  Cranfield 
had  written  a  ludicrous  account  of  the  affair  to  the  king,  and 
vaunted  his  dexterity  in  outwitting  the  people  of  Boston,  whom 
he  described  as  a  crew  of  seditious  miscreants  and  rebels  ;  and 
that  the  publication  of  the  story  had  exposed  them  to  the  de 
rision  of  the  royal  court.1 

The  American  deputies  found  their  sovereign  intoxicated 
with  the  triumph  of  his  victorious  prerogative,  impatient  of  all 
farther  vacation  of  his  revenge,  and  incensed  to  the  highest 
degree  against  a  province  that  had  so  long  presumed  to  with 
stand  his  will.  Their  credentials,  which  were  exhibited  to 
Sir  Lionel  Jenkins,  the  secretary  of  state,  were  at  once  de 
clared  to  be  insufficient  ;  and  they  were  informed,  that,  unless 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


368  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

a  commission  more  ample  and  satisfactory  were  immediately 
produced,  it  was  his  Majesty's  pleasure  that  a  writ  of  quo 
warranto  against  their  country's  charter  should  issue  without 
delay.  The  deputies  communicated  this  peremptory  injunc 
tion  to  their  constituents  ;  assuring  them,  at  the  same  time, 
that  the  predicament  of  the  colony  was  desperate  ;  and  leav 
ing  them  to  determine  whether  it  was  most  advisable  to  sub 
mit  themselves  unreservedly  to  his  Majesty's  pleasure,  or  to 
abide  the  issue  of  a  process  which  would  certainly  be  fatal. 
This  important  question,  the  determination  of  which  was  to  be 
the  last  exercise  of  their  highly  prized  liberty,  was  solemnly 
debated,  both  in  the  General  Court,  and,  as  was  meet,  by  the 
inhabitants  of  the  province  at  large  ;  and  the  prevailing  senti 
ment  was  declared  to  be,  "  that  it  was  better  to  die  by  other 
hands  than  by  their  own."  [1683. *]  An  earnest  address  to 
the  king  was  framed  by  the  General  Court ;  a  corresponding 
one  was  signed  by  the  inhabitants  at  large  ;  and  the  agents 
were  directed  to  present  or  suppress  these  addresses  according 
to  their  own  discretion.  They  were  likewise  authorized  to  re 
sign  the  title-deeds  of  the  province  of  Maine,  if,  by  so  doing, 
they  could  preserve  the  charter  of  Massachusetts  ;  and  they 
were,  finally,  assured  of  the  irrevocable  determination  of  their 
constituents  to  adhere  to  the  charter,  and  never  to  show  them 
selves  unworthy  of  liberty  by  making  a  voluntary  surrender  of 
it.  The  communication  of  this  magnanimous  answer  put  an 
end  to  the  functions  of  the  deputies  ;  and  a  writ  of  quo  war 
ranto  having  been  issued  forthwith  against  the  colony,  they 
desired  leave  to  retire  from  the  scene  of  this  procedure,  and 
were  permitted  to  return  to  Boston. 

They  were  instantly  followed  by  Randolph,  who  had  pre 
sented  to  the  Committee  of  Plantations  a  catalogue  of  crimes 
and  misdemeanours  which  he  imputed  to  the  provincial  govern 
ment,  and  was  now  selected  to  carry  the  fatal  writ  across  the 
Atlantic.  The  communication  was  highly  agreeable  to  the 

1  This  year,  died  Roger  Williams,  founder  of  the  settlement  of  Providence, 
and  one  of  the  founders  of  the  State  of  Rhode  Island ;  his  admirable  piety  and 
philanthropy  and  singularly  virtuous  and  useful  life  have  been  strikingly  illus 
trated  in  the  third  volume  of  the  Collections  of  the  Rhode  Island  Historical 
Society,  —  a  composition  of  very  great  merit,  but  defaced  by  a  strain  of  hostile 
prejudice  against  the  early  colonists  of  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut. 


CHAP.  IV.]  CHARTER  OF  MASSACHUSETTS  ANNULLED.     369 

messenger  who  conveyed  it ;  and  Randolph  performed  [Octo 
ber,  1683]  his  part  with  an  ostent  of  triumphant  satisfaction  that 
added  insult  to  injury,  and  increased  the  detestation  with  which 
he  was  universally  regarded.  The  king,  at  the  same  time,  made 
a  last  endeavour  to  induce  the  colonists  to  spare  him  the  tedious 
formalities  of  legal  process.  He  declared,  that,  if  before  judg 
ment  they  would  unreservedly  submit  and  resign  themselves 
to  his  pleasure,  he  would  study  their  interest  as  well  as  his 
own  in  composing  the  new  charter,  and  make  no  farther  inno 
vation  on  the  original  constitution  of  the  province  than  should 
be  necessary  for  the  due  support  of  his  authority.  To  add 
weight  to  this  suggestion,  the  colonists  were  apprized,  that  all 
the  corporations  in  England,  except  the  city  of  London,  had 
surrendered  their  privileges  to  the  king  ;  and  abstracts  of  the 
legal  proceedings  which  had  proved  fatal  to  the  charter  of 
London  were  circulated  through  the  province,  —  that  all  might 
learn  the  hopelessness  of  a  contest  with  royal  authority.  But 
the  people  of  Massachusetts  were  not  to  be  moved  from  their 
purpose  by  the  threats  of  despotic  power  or  the  example  of 
general  servility.  They  had  acted  well,  and  had  now  to  suffer 
well ;  and  disdainfully  refused  to  diminish  the  infamy  of  their 
oppressor  by  sharing  it  with  him.  A  majority  of  the  council, 
dejected  and  overwhelmed  by  their  calamities,  voted  an  ad 
dress  of  submission  to  the  king  ;  but,  with  more  erect  spirit, 
the  house  of  delegates,  imbued  with  the  general  feeling  of  the 
people,  and  supported  by  the  approbation  of  the  clergy,  re 
jected  the  address,  and  adhered  to  their  former  resolutions. 
[1683.]  The  process  of  quo  warranto  was  in  consequence 
urged  forward  with  all  the  expedition  that  was  compatible  with 
forensic  formality.  Among  other  instances  of  tyrannical  con 
tempt  of  justice,  the  summons  which  required  the  colony  to 
defend  itself  was  transmitted  so  tardily,  that,  before  compliance 
with  it  was  possible,  the  space  assigned  for  such  compliance 
had  elapsed.  In  Trinity  Term  of  the  following  year  [1684], 
judgment  was  pronounced  by  the  English  Court  of  King's 
Bench  against  the  Governor  and  Company  of  Massachusetts, 
"that  their  letters  patent  and  the  enrolment  thereof  be  can 
celled  "  ;  and  in  the  year  after,  an  official  copy  of  this  judg- 
VOL.  i.  47 


370  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

merit  was  received  by  the  secretary  of  the   General  Court. 
[2d  July,  1685.]  * 

Thus  was  the  system  of  liberty  that  flourished  for  sixty 
years  in  Massachusetts  overthrown  by  the  descendant  of  the 
princes  whose  tyranny  had  led  to  its  establishment,  after  being 
defended  by  the  children  of  the  original  settlers  with  the  same 
hardy  and  generous  virtue  that  their  fathers  had  exerted  in 
founding  and  rearing  it.  The  venerable  Bradstreet,  who  ac 
companied  the  first  emigrants  to  Massachusetts  in  1630,  was 
still  alive,  and  was  governor  of  the  colony  at  the  period  of  the 
subversion  of  those  institutions  which  he  had  contributed  to 
plant  in  the  desert,  and  had  so  long  continued  to  adorn  and 
enjoy.  Perhaps  he  now  discerned  the  vanity  of  those  senti 
ments  that  had  prompted  so  many  of  the  coevals  whom  he 
survived  to  lament  their  deaths  as  premature.  But  the  aged 
eyes  that  beheld  this  eclipse  of  New  England's  prosperity 
were  not  yet  to  close  till  they  had  seen  the  return  of  better 
days. 

That  the  measures  of  the  king  were  in  the  highest  degree 
unjust  and  tyrannical  appears  manifest  beyond  all  decent  de 
nial  ;  and  that  the  legal  adjudication  by  which  he  masked  his 
tyranny  was  never  annulled  by  the  English  parliament  is  a 
circumstance  very  little  creditable  to  English  justice.  The 
House  of  Commons,  indeed,  shortly  after  the  Revolution, 
inflamed  with  indignation  at  the  first  recital  of  the  transactions 
which  we  have  now  witnessed,  voted  a  resolve  declaring  "  that 
those  quo  warrantos  against  the  charters  of  New  England  were 
illegal  and  void "  ;  and  followed  up  this  resolve  by  a  bill  for 
restoring  the  charter  of  Massachusetts.  But  the  progress  of 
the  bill  was  arrested  in  the  House  of  Lords  by  a  sudden  pro 
rogation  of  parliament  ;  and  the  Commons  were  afterwards 
prevailed  with  to  depart  from  their  purpose  by  the  arguments 
of  Treby,  Somers,  and  Holt,2  whose  eminent  faculties  and 
liberal  principles  could  not  exempt  them  from  the  influence  of 
a  superstitious  prejudice,  generated  by  their  professional  habits, 
in  favor  of  the  sacredness  of  legal  formalities. 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers.  *  Ibid. 


CHAP.  V.]  KIRKE    APPOINTED  GOVERNOR.  371 


CHAPTER    V. 

Designs  —  and  Death  of  Charles  the  Second.  —  Government  of  Massachusetta 
under  a  temporary  Commission  from  James  the  Second.  —  Andros  appoint 
ed  Governor  of  New  England.  — •  Submission  of  Rhode  Island.  —  Effort  to 
preserve  the  Charter  of  Connecticut  —  Oppressive  Government  of  Andros. 
—  Colonial  Policy  of  the  King. —  Sir  William  Phips. — Indian  Hostilities 
renewed  by  the  Intrigues  of  the  French. — Insurrection  at  Boston.  —  An 
dros  deposed  —  and  the  ancient  Government  restored.  —  Connecticut  and 
Rhode  Island  resume  their  Charters.  —  William  and  Mary  proclaimed.  — 
War  with  the  French  and  Indians.  —  Sir  William  Phips  conquers  Acadia. 
Ineffectual  Expedition  against  Quebec.  —  Impeachment  of  Andros  by  the 
Colony  discouraged  by  the  English  Ministers  —  and  dismissed.  —  The 
King  refuses  to  restore  the  ancient  Constitution  of  Massachusetts.  —  Tenor 
of  the  new  Charter.  —  Sir  William  Phips  Governor.  —  The  New  England 
Witchcraft.  —  Death  of  Phips.  —  War  with  the  French  and  Indians.  — 
Loss  of  Acadia.  —  Peace  of  Ryswick.  —  Moral  arid  Political  State  of  New 
England. 

So  eager  was  Charles  to  complete  the  execution  of  his  long 
cherished  designs  on  Massachusetts,  that,  in  November,  1684, 
immediately  after  the  judgment  of  the  Court  of  King's  Bench 
against  its  charter  was  pronounced,  he  began  to  make  arrange 
ments  for  the  new  government  of  the  colony.  Though  not 
even  a  complaint  was  pretended  against  New  Plymouth,  he 
scrupled  not  to  involve  this  settlement  in  the  same  fate  ;  and 
as  if  he  purposed  to  consummate  his  tyranny  and  vengeance  by 
a  measure  that  should  surpass  the  darkest  anticipations  enter 
tained  in  New  England,  he  selected  as  the  delegate  of  his  pre 
rogative  a  man,  than  whom  it  would  be  difficult,  in  all  the 
records  of  human  wickedness  and  oppression,  to  find  one  who 
has  excited  to  a  greater  degree  the  abhorrence  and  indignation 
of  his  fellow-creatures.  The  notorious  Colonel  Kirke,  whose 
ferocious  and  detestable  cruelty  has  secured  him  an  immortality 
of  infamy  in  the  history  of  England,  was  appointed  governor  of 
Massachusetts,  New  Hampshire,  Maine,  and  New  Plymouth ; 
and  it  was  determined  that  no  representative  assembly  of  the 


HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

colonists  should  be  permitted  to  exist,  but  that  all  the  functions 
of  municipal  authority  should  be  vested  in  the  governor  and  a 
council  appointed  during  the  royal  pleasure.  This  arbitrary 
policy  was  approved  by  all  the  ministers  of  Charles,  except 
the  Marquis  of  Halifax,  who  espoused  the  cause  of  the  colo 
nists  with  generous  zeal,  and  warmly,  but  vainly,  urged  that  they 
were  entitled  to  enjoy  the  same  laws  and  institutions  that  pre 
vailed  in  the  parent  state.1  Though  Kirke  had  not  yet  com 
mitted  the  enormities  by  which  he  was  destined  to  illustrate 
his  name  in  the  West  of  England,  he  had  already  given  such 
indications  of  his  disposition,  in  the  government  of  Tangier, 
that  the  tidings  of  his  appointment  filled  the  inhabitants  of  the 
colony  with  horror  and  dismay.  But  before  the  royal  com 
mission  and  instructions  to  this  ruffian  were  completed,  the  ca 
reer  of  the  monarch  himself  was  interrupted  by  death  ;  and 
Kirke  was  reserved  to  contribute  by  his  sanguinary  violence  in 
England  to  bring  hatred  and  exile  on  Charles's  successor. 
This  successor,  James  the  Second,  from  whose  stern,  inflex 
ible  temper  and  lofty  ideas  of  royal  prerogative  the  most 
gloomy  presages  of  tyranny  were  derived,  was  proclaimed  in 
Boston  with  melancholy  solemnity.  [April,  1685.]  2 

These  presages  were  verified  by  the  conduct  of  the  new 
sovereign.  Soon  after  his  accession  to  the  throne,  he  appoint 
ed,  by  special  commission,  a  provisional  government  of  Mas 
sachusetts,  New  Hampshire,  Maine,  and  New  Plymouth,  to 
be  administered  by  a  president  and  council  selected  from  the 
inhabitants  of  Massachusetts,  whose  functions  were  merely  ex 
ecutive,  and  were  to  endure  till  the  establishment  of  a  fixed 
and  permanent  system.  The  functionaries  thus  appointed  were 
directed  to  concede  liberty  of  conscience  to  all  persons,  but  to 
bestow  peculiar  encouragement  on  the  votaries  of  the  church 
of  England  ;  to  determine  all  suits  originating  within  the  colo 
ny,  but  to  admit  appeals  from  their  sentences  to  the  king  ; 

1  The  French  court  and  the  Duke  of  York  remonstrated  with  Charles  on 
the  impolicy  of  retaining  in  office  a  man  who  professed  such  sentiments. 
Barillon's  Correspondence  in  the  Appendix  to  Fox's  History  of  James  the 
Second.  "  Even  at  this  early  period,  says  Mr.  Fox,  "  a  question  relative  to 
North  American  liberty,  and  even  to  North  American  taxation,  was  con 
sidered  as  the  test  of  principles  friendly  or  adverse  to  arbitrary  power  at 
home." 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 


CHAP.  V.]    PROVISIONAL  GOVERNMENT.  — DUDLEY.  373 

and  to  defray  the  expenses  of  their  government  by  levying  the 
taxes  previously  imposed.  This  commission  was  appointed  to 
be  produced  before  the  General  Court  at  Boston,  not  as 
still  considered  a  body  administering  legal  authority,  but  as  a 
convocation  of  individuals  of  the  greatest  influence  and  con 
sideration  in  the  province.  In  answer  to  the  communication 
of  its  contents,  the  Court  voted  [May,  1686]  a  unanimous 
resolution,  in  which  they  protested  that  the  inhabitants  of  Mas 
sachusetts  were  deprived  of  the  rights  of  freemen  by  the  sys 
tem  of  government  which  had  been  announced  to  them,  and 
that  it  deeply  concerned  both  those  who  introduced  and  those 
who  were  subjected  to  the  operation  of  this  system  to  reflect 
how  far  it  was  safe  to  pursue  it.  For  themselves,  they  de 
clared,  that,  if  the  newly  appointed  officers  should  think  proper 
to  exercise  their  functions,  though  they  could  never  regard 
them  as  invested  with  constitutional  power,  they  would  demean 
themselves,  notwithstanding,  as  loyal  subjects,  and  humbly 
make  their  addresses  to  God,  and  in  due  time  to  their  prince, 
for  relief. 

The  president  named  in  the  commission  was  Dudley,  who 
had  previously  been  one  of  the  deputies  of  the  province  to 
England,  and  whose  conduct  justified,  in  some  degree,  the 
jealousy  with  which  the  colonists  ever  regarded  the  persons  to 
whom  they  were  constrained  to  intrust  that  important  office. 
The  patriotic  virtue  of  this  man,  without  being  utterly  dis 
solved,  was  relaxed  by  the  beams  of  regal  splendor  ;  and  he 
had  not  been  able  to  look  on  the  pomp  and  show  of  aristocrati- 
cal  institutions  with  philosophic  composure  or  undesiring  eyes. 
Despairing  of  his  ability  at  once  to  serve  and  gratify  his 
country,  he.  applied  himself  with  more  success  to  cultivate  his 
own  interest  at  the  English  court ;  and  in  pursuing  this  crooked 
policy,  he  seems  to  have  flattered  himself  with  the  hope  that 
the  interest  of  his  fellow-citizens  might  be  more  effectually  pro 
moted  by  his  own  advancement  to  official  preeminence  among 
them,  than  by  the  exclusion  which  he  would  incur,  in  common 
with  themselves,  by  a  stricter  adherence  to  the  line  of  integrity. 
Though  he  accepted  the  commission,  and  persuaded  the  other 
persons  who  were  associated  with  him  to  imitate  his  example, 
he  continued  to  demonstrate  a  friendly  regard  to  the  rights  of 


374  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

the  people,  and  to  the  municipal  institutions  which  they  so 
highly  valued.  Not  only  was  immediate  change  in  the  pro 
vincial  magistracy  avoided,  but  the  commissioners,  in  defer 
ence  to  the  public  feeling,  transmitted  a  memorial  to  the  Eng 
lish  court,  affirming  that  a  well  regulated  assembly  of  the  repre 
sentatives  of  the  people  was  urgently  necessary,  and  ought  in 
their  opinion  to  be  established  without  delay.  This  moderate 
conduct,  however,  gave  little  satisfaction  to  any  of  the  parties 
whom  they  desired  to  please.  The  people  were  indignant  to 
behold  a  system  which  was  erected  on  the  ruins  of  their  liber 
ty  administered  by  their  own  fellow-citizens,  and  above  all  by 
the  man  whom  they  had  lately  appointed  to  resist  its  introduc 
tion  among  them  ;  and  nothing  but  the  apprehension  of  seeing 
him  replaced  by  Kirke,  whose  massacres  in  England  seemed 
gloomily  to  foretell  the  treatment  of  America,  prevented  an 
open  expression  of  their  displeasure.  The  conduct  of  the 
commissioners  was  no  less  unsatisfactory  both  to  the  abettors 
of  arbitrary  government  in  England,  and  to  the  creatures  and 
associates  of  Randolph  within  the  province,  who  were  eager 
to  pay  court  to  the  king  by  prostrating  beneath  his  power  every 
obstacle  to  the  execution  of  his  will.  Complaints  were  soon 
transmitted  by  these  persons  to  the  English  ministers,  charging 
the  commissioners  with  conniving  at  wonted  practices  by  which 
the  trade  laws  were  evaded,  countenancing  ancient  principles 
of  civil  and  ecclesiastical  policy,  and  evincing,  in  general,  but 
a  lukewarm  affection  to  the  king's  service.1 

In  addition  to  these  causes  of  dissatisfaction  with  the  com 
missioners,  the  king  was  incited  to  proceed  to  the  completion 
of  his  plans  by  the  imperfection  of  the  temporary  arrangement 
to  which  he  had  resorted.  It  was  found  that  the  provincial 
acts  of  taxation  were  ready  to  expire  ;  and  the  commissioners, 
being  devoid  of  legislative  authority,  had  no  power  to  renew 
them.  They  employed  this  consideration  to  support  their  sug 
gestion  of  a  representative  assembly  ;  but  it  determined  the 
king  to  enlarge  the  arbitrary  authority  of  his  provincial  offi 
cers,  and  at  the  same  time  to  establish  a  permanent  administra 
tion  for  New  England.  He  consulted  the  crown  lawyers,  and 

1  Neal.    Hutchinson.     Chalmers. 


CHAP.  V.]      ANDROS,  CAPTAIN-GENERAL.          375 

in  particular  Sir  William  Jones,  the  attorney-general,  respect 
ing  the  extent  of  his  powers  ;  and  they  pronounced,  as  their 
official  opinion,  "  that,  notwithstanding  the  forfeiture  of  the 
charter  of  Massachusetts,  its  inhabitants  continued  English  sub 
jects,  invested  with  English  liberties,  and  consequently  that 
the  king  could  no  more  grant  a  commission  to  levy  money  on 
them,  without  their  consent  in  an  assembly,  than  they  could 
discharge  themselves  from  their  allegiance  "  ;  a  truth,  of  which 
the  discovery  implies  no  extraordinary  legal  knowledge  or 
acuteness,  but  of  which  this  open  declaration  bespeaks  more 
honesty  than  we  might  have  expected  from  persons  selected  by 
the  monarch  from  a  society  of  lawyers,  which,  in  that  age, 
could  supply  such  instruments  as  Jeffries  and  Scroggs.  We 
must  recollect,  however,  that  lawyers,  though  professionally 
partial  to  the  authority  which  nominally  and  theoretically  con 
stitutes  the  source  and  mainspring  of  the  system  which  they 
administer,  cherish  also,  in  their  strong  predilection  for  those 
forms  and  precedents  that  practically  constitute  their  own  in 
fluence  and  the  peculiar  mystery  of  their  science,  a  principle 
that  frequently  protects  liberty  and  befriends  substantial  justice. 
But  James  was  too  much  enamoured  of  arbitrary  power  to 
be  deterred  from  the  indulgence  of  it  by  any  obstacle  inferior 
to  invincible  necessity  ;  and  accordingly,  without  paying  the 
slightest  regard  to  an  opinion  supported  only  by  the  pens  of 
lawyers,  he  determined  to  establish  a  complete  tyranny  in  New 
England,  by  combining  the  whole  legislative  and  executive  au 
thority  in  the  persons  of  a  governor  and  council  to  be  named 
by  himself.  Kirke  had  been  found  too  useful,  as  an  instrument 
of  terror  in  England,  to  be  spared  to  America.  But  Sir  Ed 
mund  Andros,  who  had  signalized  his  devotion  to  arbitrary 
power  in  the  government  of  New  York,  was  now  appointed 
captain-general  and  vice-admiral  of  Massachusetts,  New  Hamp 
shire,  Maine,  New  Plymouth,  and  certain  dependent  territories, 
during  the  pleasure  of  the  king.  He  was  empowered,  with 
consent  of  a  board  of  counsellors,  to  make  ordinances  for  the 
colonies,  not  inconsistent  with  the  laws  of  England,  and  which 
were  to  be  submitted  to  the  king  for  his  approbation  or  dissent, 
and  to  impose  taxes  for  the  support  of  government.  He  was 
directed  to  govern  the  people  in  conformity  with  the  tenor  of 


376  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

his  commission,  of  a  separate  letter  of  instructions  with  which 
he  was  at  the  same  time  furnished,  and  of  the  laws  which  were 
then  in  force  or  might  be  afterwards  enacted.  The  governor 
and  council  were  also  constituted  a  court  of  record  ;  and  from 
their  decisions  an  appeal  was  competent  to  the  king.  The 
greater  part  of  the  instructions  that  were  communicated  to 
Andros  are  of  a  nature  that  would  do  honor  to  the  patriotism 
of  the  king,  if  the  praise  of  this  virtue  were  due  to  a  barren 
desire  to  promote  the  welfare  of  his  people,  accompanied  with 
the  most  effectual  exertions  to  strip  them  of  every  security  by 
which  their  welfare  might  be  guarded. 

Andros  was  directed  to  promote  no  persons  to  offices  of 
trust,  but  colonists  of  fair  character  and  competent  estate,  and 
to  displace  none  without  sufficient  cause  ;  to  respect  and  ad 
minister  the  existing  laws  of  the  country,  in  so  far  as  they  were 
not  inconsistent  with  his  commission  or  instructions  ;  to  dis 
pose  of  the  crown  lands  at  moderate  quitrents  ;  "to  take 
away  or  to  harm  no  man's  life,  member,  freehold,  or  goods, 
but  by  established  laws  of  the  country,  not  repugnant  to  those 
of  the  realm  "  ;  to  discipline  and  arm  the  inhabitants  for  the 
defence  of  the  country,  but  not  to  obstruct  their  attention  to 
their  own  private  business  and  necessary  affairs  ;  to  encourage 
freedom  of  commerce  by  restraining  engrossers  ;  to  check  the 
excessive  severity  of  masters  to  their  servants,  and  to  punish 
with  death  the  slayers  of  Indians  or  negroes  ;  to  allow  no  print 
ing-press  to  exist ;  and  to  grant  universal  toleration  in  religion, 
but  special  encouragement  to  the  church  of  England.  Except 
the  restraint  of  printing  (which,  though  enjoined,  appears  not 
to  have  been  carried  into  effect),  there  is  not  one  of  these  in 
structions  that  expresses  a  spirit  of  despotism  ;  and  yet  the 
whole  system  was  silently  pervaded  by  that  spirit ;  for  as  there 
were  no  securities  provided  for  the  accomplishment  of  the 
king's  benevolent  directions,  so  there  were  no  checks  estab 
lished  to  restrain  the  abuse  of  the  powers  with  which  the  gov 
ernor  was  intrusted.  The  king  was  willing  that  his  subjects 
should  be  happy,  but  not  that  they  should  be  free,  or  entitled 
to  pursue  a  scheme  of  happiness  independent  of  his  instruction 
and  control ;  and  this  conjunction  of  a  desire  to  promote  hu 
man  welfare,  with  an  aversion  to  the  means  most  likely  to 


CHAP.  V.]          COLONIAL  POLICY  OF  JAMES  II.  377 

secure  it,  suggests  the  explanation,  perhaps  the  apology,  of  an 
error  to  which  despotic  sovereigns  are  inveterately  liable. 
Trained  in  habits  of  indulgence  of  their  own  will,  and  in  sen 
timents  of  respect  for  its  force  and  efficacy,  they  learn  to  con 
sider  it  as  what  not  only  ought  to  be,  but  must  be,  irresistible  ; 
and  feel  no  less  secure  of  ability  to  make  men  happy  without 
their  own  cooperation,  than  of  the  right  to  balk  the  natural 
desire  of  mankind  to  be  the  providers  and  guardians  of  their 
proper  welfare.  The  possession  of  absolute  power  renders 
self-denial  the  highest  effort  of  virtue  ;  and  the  absolute  mon 
arch,  who  should  demonstrate  a  just  regard  to  the  rights  of  his 
fellow-creatures,  would  deserve  to  be  honored  as  one  of  the 
most  magnanimous  of  human  beings.  Furnished  with  the  in 
structions  which  we  have  seen  for  the  mitigation  of  his  arbi 
trary  power,  and  attended  by  a  few  companies  of  soldiers  for 
its  support,  Andros  arrived  in  Boston  [December,  1685]  ;  and 
presenting  himself  as  the  substitute  for  the  dreaded  and  detest 
ed  Kirke,  and  commencing  his  administration  with  many  gra 
cious  expressions  of  good- will,  he  was  received  more  favorably 
than  might  have  been  expected.  But  his  popularity  was  short 
lived.  Instead  of  conforming  to  his  instructions,  he  copied 
and  even  exceeded  the  arbitrary  behaviour  of  his  master  in 
England,  and  committed  the  most  tyrannical  violence  and  op 
pressive  exactions.1  Dudley,  the  late  president,  and  several 
of  his  colleagues,  were  associated  as  counsellors  of  the  new  ad 
ministration, —  which  was  thus  loaded,  in  the  beginning  of  its 
career,  with  the  weight  of  their  unpopularity,  and  in  the  end 
involved  them  in  deeper  odium  and  disgrace. 

It  was  the  purpose  of  James  to  consolidate  the  force  of  all 
the  British  colonies  in  one  general  government  ;  and  Rhode 
Island  and  Connecticut  were  now  to  experience  that  their  des 
tiny  was  involved  in  that  of  Massachusetts.  The  inhabitants 
of  Rhode  Island,  on  learning  the  accession  of  the  king,  in 
stantly  transmitted  an  address  congratulating  him  on  his  eleva 
tion,  acknowledging  themselves  his  loyal  subjects,  and  begging 
his  protection  of  their  chartered  rights.  Yet  the  humility  of 
their  supplications  could  not  protect  them  from  the  conse- 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 
VOL.    I.  48 


378  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

quences  of  the  plans  he  had  embraced  for  the  general  govern 
ment  of  New  England.  Articles  of  high  misdemeanour  were 
exhibited  against  them  before  the  Lords  of  the  Committee  of 
Colonies,  charging  them  with  breaches  of  their  charter,  and 
with  opposition  to  the  Acts  of  Navigation  ;  and  before  the 
close  of  the  year  1685,  they  received  notice  of  the  institution 
of  a  process  of  quo  warranto  against  their  patent.  Without 
hesitation,  they  protested  that  they  would  not  contend  with 
their  sovereign,  and  passed  an  act,  in  full  assembly,  formally 
surrendering  their  provincial  charter  and  all  the  powers  it  con 
ferred.  By  a  fresh  address  they  "  humbly  prostrated  them 
selves,  their  privileges,  their  all,  at  the  gracious  feet  of  his 
Majesty,  with  an  entire  resolution  to  serve  him  with  faithful 
hearts."  This  abject  language  emboldened,  without  concil 
iating,  the  king  ;  who,  accounting  legal  solemnities  a  superfluous 
ceremony  with  persons  so  obsequious  to  his  will,  proceeded, 
without  farther  delay,  to  impose  the  yoke  which  the  people 
sought  to  evade  by  deserving  it.  But  his  eagerness  to  accom 
plish  his  object  with  rapidity,  though  it  probably  inflicted  a 
salutary  disappointment  on  this  people  at  the  time,  proved  ul 
timately  beneficial  to  their  political  interests  by  preserving  their 
charter  from  a  legal  extinction  ;  and  this  benefit,  which  a  simi 
lar  improvidence  afforded  to  the  people  of  Connecticut,  was 
ascertained  at  the  era  of  the  British  Revolution.  In  conse 
quence  of  the  last  address  from  Rhode  Island,  Andros  was 
charged  to  extend  his  administration  to  this  province  ;  and  in 
the  same  month  that  witnessed  his  arrival  at  Boston  he  visited 
Rhode  Island,  where  he  dissolved  the  provincial  corporation, 
broke  its  seal,  and,  admitting  five  of  the  inhabitants  into  his 
legislative  council,  assumed  the  exercise  of  all  the  functions  of 
government.1 

Connecticut  had  also  transmitted  an  address  to  the  king  on 
his  accession,  and  vainly  solicited  the  preservation  of  her  priv 
ileges.  When  the  articles  of  misdemeanour  were  exhibited 
against  Rhode  Island,  a  measure  of  similar  import  was  em 
ployed  against  the  governor  and  assembly  of  Connecticut,  who 
were  reproached  with  framing  laws  contrary  in  tenor  to  those 

1  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 


CHAP.  V.]  QUO  WARRANTO  AGAINST  CONNECTICUT.      379 

of  England  ;  of  extorting  unreasonable  fines  ;  of  administering 
an  oath  of  fidelity  to  their  own  corporation,  in  contradistinc 
tion  to  the  oath  of  allegiance  ;  of  intolerance  in  ecclesiastical 
polity  ;  and  of  denial  of  justice.  These  charges,  which  were 
supposed  to  infer  a  forfeiture  of  the  charter,  were  remitted  to 
Sawyer,  the  attorney-general,  with  directions  to  expedite  a 
writ  of  quo  warranto  against  the  colony.  The  writ  was  issued, 
and  Randolph,  the  general  enemy  of  American  liberty  and  of 
ficious  partisan  of  arbitrary  power,  offered  his  services  in  con 
veying  it  across  the  Atlantic.  The  governor  and  the  assembly 
of  Connecticut  had  for  some  time  remarked  the  storm  approach 
ing,  and,  knowing  that  direct  resistance  was  vain,  they  endeav 
oured,  by  address,  to  elude  what  they  were  unable  to  repel. 
After  delaying,  as  long  as  possible,  to  make  any  signification 
of  their  intentions,  they  were  convinced,  by  the  arrival  of  Sir 
Edmund  Andros  at  Boston,  and  his  conduct  in  Rhode  Island, 
that  the  designs  of  the  king  were  to  be  vigorously  pursued,  and 
that  they  could  not  hope  to  be  indulged  with  farther  space  for 
deliberation.  They  wrote,  accordingly,  to  the  secretary  of 
state,  expressing  a  strong  desire  to  retain  their  present  consti 
tution  ;  but  requesting,  if  it  were  the  irrevocable  purpose  of 
their  sovereign  to  dispose  otherwise  of  them,  that  they  might 
be  incorporated  with  Massachusetts,  and  share  the  fortunes  of 
a  people  with  whom  they  had  always  maintained  a  friendly  cor 
respondence,  and  whose  principles  and  manners  they  under 
stood  and  approved.  This  was  hastily  construed  by  the  Brit 
ish  government  into  a  surrender  of  the  provincial  constitution ; 
and  Andros  was  commanded  to  annex  this  province,  also,  to  his 
jurisdiction. 

Randolph,  who  seems  to  have  been  qualified  not  less  by 
genius  than  inclination  to  promote  the  success  of  tyrannical  de 
signs,  advised  the  English  ministers  to  prosecute  the  quo  war 
ranto  to  a  judicial  issue  ;  assuring  them  that  the  government  of 
Connecticut  would  never  consent  to  do,  nor  acknowledge  that 
they  had  actually  done,  what  was  equivalent  to  an  express  sur 
render  of  the  rights  of  the  people.  It  was  matter  of  regret 
to  the  ministers  and  crown  lawyers  of  a  later  age,  that  this 
politic  suggestion  was  not  adopted.  But  the  king  was  too 


380  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

eager  to  snatch  the  boon  that  seemed  within  his  reach,  to  wait 
the  tedious  formalities  of  the  law  ;  and  no  farther  judicial  pro 
ceedings  ensued  on  the  quo  warranto.  In  conformity  with  his 
orders,  Andros  marched  at  the  head  of  a  body  of  troops  to 
Hartford  [October,  1687],  the  seat  of  the  provincial  govern 
ment,  where  he  demanded  that  the  charter  should  be  delivered 
into  his  hands.  The  people  were  extremely  desirous  to  pre 
serve  at  least  the  document  of  rights,  which  the  return  of 
better  times  might  enable  them  to  assert  with  advantage.  The 
charter  was  laid  on  the  table  of  the  assembly,  and  some  of  the 
principal  inhabitants  of  the  colony  addressed  Andros  at  con 
siderable  length,  recounting  the  exertions  that  had  been  made, 
and  the  hardships  that  had  been  incurred,  in  order  to  found  the 
institutions  which  he  was  come  to  destroy  ;  entreating  him  yet 
to  spare  them,  or  at  least  to  leave  the  people  in  possession  of 
the  patent,  as  a  testimonial  of  the  favor  and  happiness  they 
had  hitherto  enjoyed.  The  debate  was  earnest,  but  orderly, 
and  protracted  to  a  late  hour  in  the  evening.  As  the  day 
declined,  lights  were  introduced  into  the  hall,  which  was  grad 
ually  surrounded  by  a  numerous  concourse  of  the  bravest  and 
most  determined  men  in  the  province,  prepared  to  defend  their 
representatives  against  the  apprehended  violence  of  Andros 
and  his  armed  followers.  At  length,  their  arguments  proving 
quite  ineffectual,  a  measure,  supposed  to  have  been  previously 
concerted  by  the  inhabitants,  was  coolly,  resolutely,  and  suc 
cessfully  conducted.  The  lights  were  extinguished,  as  if  by 
accident ;  and  Captain  Wadsworth,  laying  hold  of  the  charter, 
disappeared  with  it  before  they  could  be  rekindled.  He  con 
veyed  it  securely  through  the  crowd,  —  who  opened  to  let  him 
pass,  and  closed  their  ranks  as  he  proceeded, — and  depos 
ited  it  in  the  hollow  of  an  ancient  oak,  which  retained  the 
precious  deposit  till  the  era  of  the  British  Revolution,  and 
was  long  regarded  with  veneration  by  the  people,  as  the  me 
morial  and  associate  of  a  transaction  so  interesting  to  their 
liberties.  Andros,  disappointed  in  all  his  efforts  to  recover 
the  charter,  or  ascertain  the  person  by  whom  it  was  secreted, 
contented  himself  with  declaring  that  its  institutions  were  dis 
solved  ;  and  assuming  to  himself  the  exercise  of  supreme  au- 


CHAP.V.]  OPPRESSIVE  TAXATION.  381 

thority,  he  created  two  of  the  principal  inhabitants  members 
of  his  legislative  council.1 

Having  thus  united  all  the  New  England  States  under  one 
comprehensive  system  of  arbitrary  government,  Andros,  with 
the  assistance  of  his  grand  legislative  council,  selected  from 
the  inhabitants  of  the  several  provinces,  addressed  himself  to 
the  task  of  composing  laws  and  regulations  calculated  to  fortify 
his  authority.  An  act  restoring  the  former  taxes  obtained  the 
assent  of  the  council ;  and  yet  even  this  indispensable  pro 
vision  was  obstructed  by  the  reluctance  with  which  the  coun 
sellors,  though  selected  by  Andros  himself,  consented  to  be 
come  the  instruments  of  riveting  the  shackles  of  their  country. 
The  only  farther  opposition  which  he  experienced  proceeded 
from  the  inhabitants  of  the  county  of  Essex,  in  Massachusetts, 
who,  insisting  that  they  were  freemen,  refused  to  pay  the  con 
tingent  assessed  upon  them  of  a  taxation  which  they  deemed 
unconstitutional.  But  their  resistance  was  easily  overpowered, 
and  their  leaders  were  severely  punished.  Andros  soon  dis 
covered  that  the  revenues  of  the  ancient  government  were 
inadequate  to  the  support  of  his  more  costly  administration  ; 
and  while  he  signified  this  defalcation  to  the  king,  he  declared, 
at  the  same  time,  with  real  or  affected  humanity,  that  the 
country  was  so  much  impoverished  by  the  effects  of  the  Indian 
war,  by  recent  losses  at  sea,  and  by  scanty  harvests,  that  an 
increase  of  taxation  could  hardly  be  endured.  But  James, 
who  had  exhausted  his  lenity  in  the  letter  of  instructions, 
answered  this  communication  by  a  peremptory  mandate  to 
raise  the  taxes  to  a  level  with  the  charges  of  administration ; 
and  Andros,  thereupon,  either  stifling  his  tenderness  for  the 
people,  or  discarding  his  superfluous  respect  to  the  moderation 
of  the  king,  proceeded  to  exercise  his  power  with  a  tyrannical 
rigor  that  rendered  his  government  universally  odious. 

The  weight  of  taxation  was  oppressively  augmented,  and 
the  fees  of  all  public  functionaries  screwed  up  to  an  enormous 
height.  The  ceremonial  of  marriage  was  altered,  and  the 
celebration  of  that  rite,  which  had  been  hitherto  committed 
to  the  civil  magistrates,  was  confined  to  the  ministers  of  the 

1  Hutchinson.     Chalmers.    Dwight's  Travels.     Trumbull. 


382  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

church  of  England,  of  whom  there  was  only  one  in  the  prov 
ince  of  Massachusetts.  The  fasts  and  thanksgivings  appJnted 
by  the  Congregational  churches  were  arbitrarily  suppressed  *>y 
the  governor,  who  maintained  that  the  regulation  of  such  me  i- 
ters  belonged  entirely  to  the  civil  power.  He  took  occasion 
repeatedly,  and  with  the  most  offensive  insolence,  to  remark, 
in  presence  of  the  council,  that  the  colonists  would  find  them 
selves  mistaken,  if  they  supposed  that  the  privileges  of  Eng 
lishmen  followed  them  to  the  extremity  of  the  earth  ;  and  that 
the  only  difference  between  their  condition  and  that  of  slaves 
was,  that  they  were  neither  bought  nor  sold.  It  was  declared 
unlawful  for  the  colonists  to  assemble  in  public  meetings,  or 
for  any  one  to  quit  the  province  without  a  passport  from  the 
governor  ;  and  Randolph,  now  at  the  summit  of  his  wishes, 
was  not  ashamed  to  boast  in  letters  to  his  friends  that  the 
rulers  of  New  England  were  "  as  arbitrary  as  the  Great  Turk." 
While  Andros  mocked  the  people  with  the  semblance  of  trial 
by  jury,  he  contrived,  by  intrigue  and  partiality  in  the  selection 
of  jurymen,  to  wreak  his  vengeance  on  every  person  who 
offended  him,  as  well  as  to  screen  the  misdeeds  of  his  own 
dependents  from  the  punishment  they  deserved.  And,  as  if 
to  heighten  the  discontent  excited  by  such  tyrannical  insolence, 
he  took  occasion  to  question  the  validity  of  the  existing  titles 
to  landed  property,  pretending  that  the  rights  acquired  under 
the  sanction  of  the  ancient  government  were  tainted  with  its 
vices  and  obnoxious  to  its  fate.1  New  grants  or  patents  from 
the  governor,  it  was  announced,  were  requisite  to  mend  the 
defective  titles  to  land  ;  and  writs  of  intrusion  were  issued 
against  all  who  refused  to  apply  for  such  patents,  and  to  pay 
the  large  fees  that  were  charged  for  them.  Most  of  the  landed 
proprietors  were  compelled  to  submit  to  this  extortion  in  order 
to  save  their  estates  from  confiscation,  —  an  extremity,  which, 
however,  was  braved  by  one  individual,  Colonel  Shrimpton, 
who  preferred  the  loss  of  his  property  to  the  recognition  of  a 
principle  which  he  deemed  both  injurious  and  dishonorable  to 
his  country.  The  king  had  now  encouraged  Andros  to  con- 

1  The  titles  of  many  of  the  proprietors  of  estates  in  New  England  depended 
upon  conveyances  executed  by  the  Indians  ;  but  Andros  declared  that  Indian 
deeds  were  no  better  than  "  the  scratch  of  a  bear's  paw." —  Belknap. 


CHAP.  V.]   DEPUTATION  FROM  NEW  ENGLAND.      383 

sider  the  people  whom  he  governed  as  a  society  of  felons  or 
rebels  ;  for  he  transmitted  to  him  express  directions  to  grant 
his  Majesty's  most  gracious  pardon  to  as  many  of  the  colonists 
as  should  apply  for  it.  But  none  had  the  meanness  to  solicit 
a  grace  that  exclusively  befitted  the  guilty.  The  only  act  of 
the  king  that  was  favorably  regarded  by  the  inhabitants  of  the 
colony  was  his  Declaration  of  Indulgence,  which  excited  so 
much  discontent  in  Britain,  even  among  the  Protestant  dissent 
ers  who  shared  its  benefit.  Notwithstanding  the  intolerance 
that  has  been  imputed  to  New  England,  this  declaration  pro 
duced  general  satisfaction  there  ;  though  some  of  the  inhabit 
ants  had  discernment  enough  to  perceive  that  the  sole  object 
of  the  king  was  the  gradual  introduction  of  the  Catholic  church 
into  Britain.1 

After  many  ineffectual  remonstrances  against  his  violence 
and  injustice  had  been  addressed  by  the  colonists  to  Andros 
himself,  two  deputies,  one  of  whom  was  Increase  Mather,  the 
most  eminent  theologian  and  most  popular  minister  in  Massa 
chusetts,  were  sent  to  England,  to  submit  the  grievances  of 
the  colony  to  the  humane  consideration  of  the  king.  [April, 
1688.]  Randolph,  whose  subservience  to  the  royal  policy 
was  rewarded  with  the  offices  of  postmaster-general  and  licens 
er  of  the  press  in  New  England,  exerted  himself  to  defeat 
the  success  of  the  deputation,  by  writing  to  the  English  court 
that  Mather  was  a  seditious  and  profligate  incendiary,  and 
that  his  object  was  to  pave  the  way  to  the  overthrow  of  regal 
government.  Yet  the  petitions  which  the  colonists  transmitted 
by  Mather  were  remarkably  moderate.  Whatever  they  might 
desire,  all  that  they  demanded  was,  that  their  freeholds  should 
be  respected,  and  that  a  representative  assembly  should  be 
established  for  the  purpose,  at  least,  of  adjusting  their  taxation. 
The  first  of  these  points  was  conceded  by  the  king  ;  but  with 
respect  to  the  other,  he  was  inexorable.  When  Sir  William 
Phips,  whose  spirit  and  gallantry  had  gained  this  monarch's 
esteem,  pressed  him  to  grant  the  colonists  an  assembly,  he 
replied,  "Any  thing  but  that,  Sir  William";  and  even  the 
opinion  of  Powis,  the  attorney-general,  to  whom  the  applica- 

1  Life  of  Phips,  apud  Mather.  Neal.  Dummer's  Defence  of  the  JVe«>  Eng 
land  Charters.  Hutchinson.  Chalmers.  Trumbull. 


384  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

tion  of  the  deputies  was  remitted,  and  who  reported  that  it  was 
just  and  reasonable,  produced  no  change  in  his  determination. 
James,  who  had  now  enlarged  and  completed  his  views  of 
colonial  policy,  determined  to  reduce  all  the  American  com 
munities  and  constitutions,  as  well  those  which  were  denom 
inated  proprietary  as  the  others,  to  an  immediate  dependence 
on  the  crown  ;  for  the  double  purpose  of  effacing  examples 
that  might  diminish  the  resignation  of  the  people  of  New  Eng 
land,  and  of  combining  the  force  of  all  the  colonies,  from  the 
banks  of  the  Delaware  to  the  shores  of  Nova  Scotia,  in  a 
compact  system  capable  of  presenting  a  barrier  to  the  formid 
able  encroachments  of  France.  A  general  dislike  of  liberal 
establishments  conspired  with  these  views  ;  and  the  declama 
tions  that  resounded  from  his  oppressed  subjects  in  Britain,  on 
the  happiness  and  liberty  which  America  was  reputed  to  enjoy, 
contributed,  at  this  period,  to  increase  his  aversion  to  Ameri 
can  institutions.1  In  prosecution  of  his  politic  design,  he  had 
recently  commanded  writs  of  quo  warranto  to  be  issued  for  the 
purpose  of  cancelling  all  the  colonial  patents  that  still  remained 
in  force  ;  and  shortly  before  the  arrival  of  the  deputation  from 
Massachusetts,  a  new  commission  had  extended  the  jurisdiction 
of  Andros  to  New  York  and  New  Jersey,  and  conferred  the 
appointment  of  lieutenant-governor  on  Colonel  Francis  Nich 
olson.  Andros,  with  his  usual  promptitude,  accomplished  this 
enlargement  of  his  authority  ;  and  having  appointed  his  deputy 
to  reside  at  New  York,  he  conducted  his  wide  dominion  with 
a  vigor  that  rendered  him  formidable  to  the  French,  but,  un 
happily,  still  more  formidable  and  odious  to  the  people  whom 
he  governed.2 

1  Dryden,  whose  servile  Muse  faithfully  reechoed  the  sentiments  of  the  court, 
thus  expresses  himself  in  a  dramatic  prologue  written  in  the  year  1686 :  — 

"Since  faction  ebbs,  and  rogues  grow  out  of  fashion, 
Their  penny  scribes  take  care  to  inform  the  nation 
How  well  men  thrive  in  this  or  that  plantation  : 

"  How  Pennsylvania's  air  agrees  with  Quakers, 
And  Carolina's  with  associators ; 
Both  e'en  too  good  for  madmen  and  for  traitors. 

"  Truth  is,  our  land  with  saints  is  so  run  o'er, 
And  every  age  produces  such  a  store, 
That  now  there  's  need  of  two  New  Englands  more." 

*  Neal.    Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 


CHAP.  V.]  SIR   WILLIAM  PHIPS.  385 

Sir  William  Phips,  whose  fruitless  interposition  we  have 
remarked  in  behalf  of  the  deputation  from  Massachusetts,  was 
himself  a  native  of  this  province,  and,  notwithstanding  a  mean 
education  and  the  depression  of  the  humblest  social  position, 
had  ascended  by  the  mere  force  of  superior  genius  to  a  con 
spicuous  rank,  and  gained  a  high  reputation  for  spirit,  capacity, 
and  success.  He  followed  the  employment  of  a  shepherd  at 
his  native  .place  till  he  was  eighteen  years  of  age,  and  was 
afterwards  apprenticed  to  a  ship-carpenter.  When  he  was 
freed  from  his  indentures,  he  pursued  a  seafaring  life,  and 
attained  the  station  of  captain  of  a  merchant-vessel.  An  ac 
count  which  he  happened  to  peruse  of  the  wreck  of  a  Spanish 
ship,  loaded  with  bullion,  near  the  Bahama  Islands,  about  fifty 
years  before,  inspired  him  with  the  bold  design  of  extricating 
the  buried  treasure  from  the  bowels  of  the  deep  ;  whereupon, 
transporting  himself  to  England,  he  stated  his  scheme  so  plaus 
ibly,  that  the  king  was  struck  with  it,  and,  in  1683,  sent  him 
with  a  vessel  to  undertake  the  experiment.  It  proved  unsuc 
cessful  ;  and  all  his  urgency  could  not  induce  James  to  engage 
in  a  repetition  of  it.  But  the  Duke  of  Albemarle,  resuming 
the  project,  equipped  a  vessel  for  the  purpose,  and  gave  the 
command  of  it  to  Phips,  who  now  succeeded  in  accomplish 
ing  his  expectations,  and  achieved  the  recovery  of  specie,  to 
the  value  of  at  least  £  300,000,  from  the  bottom  of  the  ocean. 
Of  this  treasure  he  obtained  a  portion  sufficient  for  his  own 
enrichment,  with  a  still  larger  meed  of  general  consideration 
and  applause.  The  king  was  advised  by  some  of  his  courtiers 
to  confiscate  the  whole  of  the  specie  thus  recovered,  on  pre 
tence  that  he  had  not  received  a  fair  representation  of  the 
project  ;  but  he  declared  that  the  representation  had  been 
perfectly  fair,  and  that  nothing  but  his  own  misgivings,  and  the 
timorous  counsels  and  mean  suspicions  of  those  courtiers  them 
selves,  had  deprived  him  of  the  riches  which  this  honest  man 
had  sought  to  procure  for  him.  He  conceived  a  high  regard 
for  Phips,  and  conferred  on  him  the  rank  of  knighthood. 
Sir  William  employed  his  influence  at  court  for  the  benefit  of 
his  country  ;  and  his  patriotism  seems  never  to  have  harmed 
him  in  the  opinion  of  the  king.  Finding  that  he  could  not 
prevail  to  obtain  the  restoration  of  the  chartered  privileges,  he 

VOL.  i.  49 


386  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

solicited  and  received  the  appointment  of  high  sheriff  of  New 
England  ;  in  the  hope,  that,  by  remedying  the  abuses  that  were 
committed  in  the  empanelling  of  juries,  he  might  create  a 
barrier  against  the  tyranny  of  Andros.  But  the  governor  and 
his  creatures,  incensed  at  this  interference,  hired  ruffians  to 
attack  his  person,  and  soon  compelled  him  to  quit  the  province 
and  take  shelter  in  Britain.  James,  shortly  before  his  own 
abdication,  among  the  other  attempts  he  made  to  conciliate  his 
subjects,  offered  Phips  the  government  of  New  England  ; 
but  Phips  refused  to  accept  this  appointment  from  a  falling 
tyrant,  and  under  a  system,  which,  instead  of  seeking  any  longer 
to  mitigate,  he  hoped  speedily  to  behold  entirely  overthrown.1 
The  discontent  of  the  people  of  New  England  continued 
meanwhile  to  increase,  insomuch  that  every  act  of  the  gov 
ernment,  however  innocent  or  even  laudable,  was  viewed 
through  the  perverting  gloom  of  a  settled  jealousy,  and  as 
cribed  with  undoubting  confidence  to  the  most  sinister  designs. 
In  order  to  discredit  the  former  provincial  authorities,  Andros 
and  Randolph  sedulously  inculcated  the  notion  that  the  Indians 
had  hitherto  been  treated  with  a  cruelty  and  injustice,  to  which 
all  the  hostilities  of  these  savages  ought  reasonably  to  be  im 
puted  ;  and  vaunted  their  own  ability  to  pacify  and  propitiate 
them  by  gentleness  and  equity.2  But  this  year  their  theory 
and  their  policy  were  alike  disgraced  by  the  furious  hostilities 
of  the  Indians  on  the  eastern  frontiers  of  New  England.  The 
movements  of  these  savages  were  excited  on  this,  as  on  former 
occasions,  by  the  insidious  artifices  of  the  French,  whose  sup 
pleness  of  character  and  demeanour,  contrasted  with  the  grave, 
unbending  spirit  of  the  English,  gave  them  in  general  a  great 
advantage  in  the  competition  for  the  favor  of  the  Indians  ;  and 
who  found  it  easier  to  direct  and  employ  than  to  check  or 
eradicate  the  treachery  and  ferocity  of  their  savage  neighbours. 
The  English  colonists  offered  to  the  Indians  terms  of  accom 
modation,  which  at  first  they  seemed  willing  to  accept ;  but 
the  encouragement  of  their  French  allies  soon  prevailed  with 
them  to  reject  all  friendly  overtures,  and  their  native  ferocity 

1  Life  of  Phips,  apud  Mather.     Neal.     Hutchinson. 

*  It  appears  that  Randolph  cultivated  the  good  opinion  of  William  Penn,  by 
writing  to  him  in  this  strain,  as  well  as  by  condemning  the  former  persecution 
of  the  Quakers  in  Massachusetts.  —  Hutchinson.  Chalmers. 

;o;; 


CHAP.  V.]        INSURRECTION  AGAINST  ANDROS.  387 

prompted  them  to  signalize  this  declaration  by  a  series  of  un 
provoked  and  unexpected  massacres.  Andros  published  a 
proclamation  requiring  that  the  murderers  should  be  delivered 
up  to  him  ;  but  the  Indians  treated  him  and  his  proclamation 
with  contempt.  In  the  depth  of  winter,  he  found  himself 
obliged  to  march  with  a  considerable  force  against  these  ene 
mies  ;  and  though  he  succeeded  in  occupying  and  fortifying 
positions  which  enabled  him  somewhat  to  restrain  their  future 
incursions,  he  inflicted  but  little  injury  upon  them,  and  lost  a 
great  many  of  his  own  men,  who  perished  in  vain  attempts  to 
follow  the  Indians  into  their  fastnesses,  in  the  most  rigorous 
season  of  the  year.  So  strong  and  so  undiscriminating  was 
the  dislike  he  excited  among  the  people  of  New  England,  that 
this  expedition  was  unjustly  ascribed  to  a  deliberate  purpose 
to  destroy  the  troops  whom  he  conducted,  by  cold  and  fam 
ine.1  Every  reproach,  however  groundless,  stuck  fast  to  the 
hated  characters  of  Andros  and  Randolph. 

At  length  [1689]  the  smothered  rage  of  the  people  broke 
forth.  In  the  spring,  some  vague  intelligence  was  received, 
by  letters  from  Virginia,  of  the  transactions  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange  in  England.  The  ancient  magistrates  and  principal 
inhabitants  of  the  province,  though  they  ardently  wished  and 
secretly  prayed  that  success  might  attend  the  Prince's  enter 
prise,  yet  determined  in  so  great  a  cause  to  incur  no  unneces 
sary  hazard,  and  quietly  to  await  a  revolution  which  they 
believed  that  no  movement  of  theirs  could  either  promote  or 
retard.  But  New  England  was  destined  tQ  accomplish  by  her 
own  efforts  her  own  liberation  ;  and  the  inhabitants  of  Mas 
sachusetts  were  now  to  exercise  the  gallant  privilege,  which, 
nearly  a  century  after,  and  in  a  conflict  still  more  arduous, 
their  children  again  were  ready  to  assert,  of  being  the  foremost 
in  resisting  oppression  and  vindicating  the  rights  and  honor  of 
their  country.  The  cautious  policy  and  prudential  dissuasions 
from  violence  that  were  employed  by  the  wealthier  and  more 
aged  colonists  were  contemned  by  the  great  body  of  the 
people,  whose  spirit  and  courage  prompted  them  to  achieve 
the  deliverance  which  they  were  less  qualified  by  foresight  and 

1  Neal.     Hutcbinson. 


388  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

patience  to  await.  Stung  with  the  recollection  of  past  inju 
ries,  their  patriotic  ardor,  on  the  first  prospect  of  relief,  could 
not  be  restrained.  In  seasons  of  revolution,  the  wealthy  and 
eminent  mingle  with  their  public  spirit  a  less  generous  concern 
for  their  valuable  private  stakes,  and  their  prospect  of  sharing 
in  official  dignities.  The  poor  have  no  rich  private  stakes  in 
their  possession  ;  no  dazzling  preferments  within  their  reach  ; 
and  consequently  less  restraint  on  the  full  flow  of  their  social 
affections.  All  at  once,  and  apparently  without  any  precon 
certed  plan,  an  insurrection  burst  out  in  the  town  of  Boston  ; 
the  drums  beat  to  arms,  the  people  flocked  together,  and  in  a 
few  hours  the  revolt  became  universal,  and  the  energy  of  the 
people  so  overpowering,  that  every  purpose  of  resisting  their 
will  was  abandoned  by  the  government.  The  scruples  of  the 
more  wealthy  and  cautious  inhabitants  were  completely  over 
come  by  the  obvious  necessity  of  interfering  to  calm  and  regu 
late  the  fervor  of  the  populace.  Andros,  Dudley,  and  others, 
to  the  number  of  fifty  of  the  most  obnoxious  characters,  were 
seized  and  imprisoned.  On  the  first  intelligence  of  the  tumult, 
Andros  sent  a  party  of  soldiers  to  apprehend  Simon  Brad- 
street  ;  a  measure  that  served  only  to  suggest  to  the  people 
who  their  chief  ought  to  be,  and  to  anticipate  the  unanimous 
choice  by  which  this  venerable  man  was  reinstated  in  the  office 
he  had  held  when  his  country  was  deprived  of  her  liberties. 
Though  now  bending  under  the  weight  of  ninety  years,  his 
intellectual  powers  had  undergone  but  little  decay  ;  he  retained 
(says  Cotton  Matter)  a  vigor  and  wisdom  that  would  have 
recommended  a  younger  man  to  the  government  of  a  greater 
colony.  As  the  tidings  of  the  revolt  spread  through  the  prov 
ince,  the  people  eagerly  flew  to  arms,  and  hurried  to  Boston 
to  cooperate  with  their  insurgent  countrymen.  To  the  assem 
bled  crowds  a  proclamation  was  read  from  the  balcony  of  the 
court-house,  detailing  the  grievances  of  the  colony,  and  im 
puting  the  whole  to  the  tyrannical  abrogation  of  the  charter. 
A  committee  of  safety  was  appointed  by  general  consent  ;  and 
an  assembly  of  representatives  being  convened  soon  after,  this 
body,  by  a  unanimous  vote,  and  with  the  hearty  concurrence 
of  the  whole  province,  declared  their  ancient  charter  and  its 
constitutions  to  be  resumed  ;  reappointed  Bradstreet  and  all 


CHAP.  V.]     GENERAL  SPREAD  OF  THE  INSURRECTION.     389 

the  other  magistrates  who  were  in  office  in  the  year  1686  ;  and 
directed  these  persons  in  all  things  to  conform  to  the  pro 
visions  of  the  charter,  "  that  this  method  of  government  may 
be  found  among  us  when  order  shall  come  from  the  higher 
powers  in  England."  They  announced  that  Andros  and  his 
fellow-prisoners  were  detained  in  custody  to  abide  the  direc 
tions  that  might  be  received  concerning  them  from  his  Highness 
the  Prince  of  Orange  and  the  English  parliament.1  What 
would  be  the  extent  and  final  issue  of  the  revolution  that  was 
in  progress  in  the  parent  state  was  yet  unknown  in  the  colo 
nies. 

The  example  of  Massachusetts  was  followed  by  the  other 
provinces  of  New  England.  When  the  tidings  of  the  revolu 
tion  at  Boston  reached  Connecticut,  the  inhabitants  determined 
no  longer  to  acknowledge  a  governor,  who,  from  the  command 
of  one  half  of  the  English  colonies,  was  now  reduced  to  the 
situation  of  an  imprisoned  delinquent.  Their  charter  reap 
peared  from  its  concealment  ;  and  their  democratical  constitu 
tion,  which  had  not  been  either  expressly  surrendered  or  legally 
dissolved,  was  instantly  restored  with  universal  satisfaction. 
The  people  of  Rhode  Island  had  never  been  required  to  give 
up  the  charter  whose  privileges  they  so  formally  and  unequivo 
cally  resigned  ;  and  now,  without  a  moment's  scruple  or  hesi 
tation,  they  protested  that  it  was  still  in  force,  and  removed  as 
well  as  they  could  the  only  obstruction  to  this  plea,  by  retract 
ing  every  prior  declaration  of  a  contrary  tenor.  New  Ply 
mouth,  in  like  manner,  resumed  instantaneously  its  ancient  form 
of  government.  In  New  Hampshire,  there  assembled  a  gen 
eral  convention  of  the  inhabitants,  who  promptly  and  unani 
mously  determined  to  reannex  their  territory  to  Massachusetts. 
In  pursuance  of  this  purpose,  they  elected  deputies  to  repre 
sent  them  in  the  General  Court  at  Boston  ;  but  King  William 
refused  to  comply  with  their  wishes,  and  in  the  sequel  appoint 
ed  a  separate  governor  for  New  Hampshire.2 

1  Lives  of  Bradstreet  and  Phips,  apud  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  The 
provisional  government  at  Boston  would  willingly  have  released  Andros,  after 
they  had  deprived  him  of  power;  but  the  people  vehemently  insisted  that  he 
should  be  detained  in  prison.  "  I  am  deeply  sensible  that  we  have  a  wolf 
by  the  ears,"  says  Daniorth,  in  a  letter  written  on  this  occasion  to  Mather, 
the  provincial  agent  in  England.  Hutchinson's  Massachusetts  Papers. 

*  Hutchinson.    Chalmers. 


390  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

Although  the  people  of  Massachusetts  at  first  distinctly  in 
timated  their  intention  to  reestablish  by  their  own  act  their  an 
cient  charter,  the  calm  reflection  that  succeeded  the  ferment 
during  which  this  purpose  had  been  broached  convinced  them 
that  its  accomplishment  was  impracticable,  and  that  the  reno 
vation  of  a  charter,  vacated  by  legal  process  before  the  tribu 
nals  of  the  parent  state,  could  proceed  only  from  the  crown 
or  legislature  of  England.  Informed  of  the  convention  of  es 
tates  convoked  by  the  Prince  of  Orange  in  England,  the  revo 
lutionary  government  of  Massachusetts  assembled  a  similar 
convention  of  the  counties  and  towns  of  the  province  ;  and  it 
was  the  opinion  of  the  majority  of  this  assembly,  that,  although 
the  charter  might  be  restored,  it  could  not  be  resumed.  In 
telligence  having  arrived  of  the  settlement  of  England,  and  of 
the  investiture  of  William  and  Mary  with  the  crown,  these 
sovereigns  were  proclaimed  in  the  colony  with  sincere  gratula- 
tion  and  extraordinary  solemnity.  [May  29,  1689.]  A  letter 
was  soon  after  addressed  by  the  king  and  queen  to  the  Colony 
of  Massachusetts,  expressing  the  royal  sanction  and  ratification 
of  the  late  transactions  of  the  people,  and  authorizing  the  pres 
ent  magistrates  to  retain  provisionally  the  administration  of  the 
provincial  government,  till  their  Majesties,  with  the  assistance 
of  the  privy  council,  should  establish  it  on  a  basis  more  per 
manent  and  satisfactory.  An  order  was  communicated,  at  the 
same  time,  to  send  Andros  and  the  other  prisoners  to  Eng 
land,  that  they  might  answer  the  charges  preferred  against 
them.  Additional  agents  were  deputed  by  the  colony  to  join 
Mather,  who  still  continued  in  England,  and,  in  concurrence 
with  him,  to  prosecute  the  charges  against  Andros,  and,  above 
all,  to  solicit  the  restoration  of  the  charter.1 

But  before  the  colonists  were  able  to  ascertain  if  their  fa 
vorite  desire  was  to  be  promoted  by  the  English  Revolution, 
they  felt  the  evil  effects  of  this  great  event,  in  the  conse 
quences  of  the  war  that  ensued  between  England  and  France. 
The  rupture  between  the  two  parent  states  quickly  extended 
itself  to  their  possessions  in  America  ;  and  the  colonies  of  New 
England  and  New  York  were  now  involved  in  bloody  and 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson. 


CHAP.  V.]  WAR  WITH  FRANCE.  — CONQUEST  OF  ACADI A.  391 

desolating  warfare  with  the  forces  of  the  French  in  Canada 
and  their  Indian  auxiliaries  and  allies.  The  hostilities  that 
were  directed  against  New  York  belong  to  another  branch  of 
this  history.  In  concert  with  them,  various  attacks  were  made 
by  numerous  bands  of  the  Indians,  in  the  conclusion  of  the 
present  year,  on  the  settlements  and  forts  in  New  Hampshire 
and  Maine  ;  and  proving  successful  in  some  instances,  they 
were  productive  of  the  most  horrid  extremities  of  savage  cru 
elty.  Aware  that  these  depredations  originated  in  Canada 
and  Acadia,  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  prepared, 
during  the  winter,  an  expedition  against  both  Port  Royal  and 
Quebec.  The  conduct  of  it  was  intrusted  to  Sir  William 
Phips,  who,  on  the  dissolution  of  the  late  arbitrary  govern 
ment,  returned  to  New  England,  in  the  hope  of  being  able  to 
render  some  service  to  his  countrymen.  Eight  small  vessels, 
with  seven  or  eight  hundred  men,  sailed  under  his  command,  in 
the  following  spring  [April,  1690],  and,  with  little  opposition, 
took  possession  of  Port  Royal  and  of  the  whole  province  of 
Acadia  ;  and,  within  a  month  after  its  departure,  the  fleet  re 
turned  loaded  with  plunder  enough  to  defray  the  whole  expense 
of  the  expedition.  But  Count  Frontignac,  the  governor  of 
Canada,  retorted  by  sharp  and  harassing  attacks  on  the  remote 
settlements  of  New  England  ;  and,  stimulating  the  activity  of 
his  Indian  allies,  kept  the  frontiers  in  a  state  of  incessant  alarm 
by  their  predatory  incursions. 

In  letters  to  King  William  the  General  Court  of  Massachu 
setts  had  forcibly  represented  the  importance  of  the  conquest 
of  Canada,  and  urgently  solicited  his  aid  in  an  expedition  for 
that  purpose  ;  but  he  was  too  much  occupied  in  Europe  to 
extend  his  exertions  to  America  ;  and  the  provincial  govern 
ment  determined  to  prosecute  the  enterprise  without  his  as 
sistance.  New  York  and  Connecticut  engaged  to  furnish  a 
body  of  men  who  were  to  march  overland  to  attack  Montreal, 
while  the  troops  of  Massachusetts  should  repair  by  sea  to  Que 
bec.  The  fleet  destined  for  this  expedition  consisted  of  near 
ly  forty  vessels,  the  largest  of  which  carried  forty -four  guns  ; 
and  the  number  of  troops  on  board  amounted  to  two  thousand. 
[Aug.  9,  1690.]  The  command  of  this  armament  was  in 
trusted  to  Sir  William  Phips,  who,  in  the  conduct  of  the  en- 


392  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

terprise,  demonstrated  his  usual  courage,  and  every  other  mili 
tary  qualification  except  that  which  experience  alone  can  con 
fer,  and  without  which,  in  warfare  with  a  civilized  enemy,  all 
the  rest  commonly  prove  unavailing.  The  troops  of  Connecti 
cut  and  New  York,  retarded  by  defective  arrangements,  and 
disappointed  of  the  assistance  of  the  friendly  Indians  who  had 
engaged  to  furnish  them  with  canoes  for  crossing  the  rivers 
they  had  to  pass,  were  compelled  to  retire  without  attacking 
Montreal  ;  and,  in  consequence,  the  whole  force  of  Canada 
was  concentrated  to  resist  the  attack  of  Phips.  His  arma 
ment  arrived  before  Quebec  so  late  in  the  season  [October] , 
that  only  an  immediate  assault  could  have  enabled  him  to  carry 
the  place  ;  but  by  unskilful  delay  the  opportunity  of  making 
such  an  attempt  with  advantage  was  irretrievably  lost.  The 
English  were  worsted  in  various  sharp  encounters,  and  finally 
compelled  to  make  a  precipitate  retreat  ;  and  the  fleet,  after 
sustaining  great  damage  in  its  homeward  voyage,  returned  to 
Boston.  [November  13.]  Such  was  the  unfortunate  issue  of  an 
enterprise  which  involved  Massachusetts  in  an  enormous  ex 
pense,  and  cost  the  lives  of  at  least  a  thousand  of  her  people. 
The  French  had  so  strongly  foreboded  its  success,  that  they 
ascribed  its  discomfiture  to  the  immediate  interposition,  of 
Heaven,  in  confounding  the  devices  of  the  enemy,  and  de 
priving  them  of  common  sense  ;  and  under  this  impression,  the 
citizens  of  Quebec  established  an  annual  procession  in  com 
memoration  of  their  deliverance.  That  the  conduct  of  Phips, 
however,  was  no  way  obnoxious  to  censure  may  be  safely  in 
ferred  from  the  fact  that  a  result  so  disastrous  brought  no  re 
proach  upon  him,  and  deprived  him  in  no  degree  of  the  favor 
of  his  countrymen.  And  yet  the  disappointment,  in  addition 
to  the  mortification  which  it  inflicted,  was  attended  with  very 
injurious  consequences. 

The  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  had  not  even  antici 
pated  the  possibility  of  miscarriage,  and  confidently  expected 
to  derive,  from  the  success  of  the  expedition,  the  same  reim 
bursement  of  expenses  which  their  former  enterprise  had  af 
forded.  "During  the  absence  of  the  forces,"  says  Cotton 
Mather,  with  an  expression  too  whimsical  for  a  matter  of  so 
much  solemnity,  "  the  wheel  of  prayer  for  them  in  New  Eng- 


CHAP.  V.]      DISASTROUS  RESULTS  OF  THE  WAR.  393 

land  had  been  kept  continually  going  round  "  ;  and  this  attempt 
to  reinforce  the  expedition  by  spiritual  cooperation  was  pur 
sued  in  conjunction  with  an  entire  neglect  of  provisions  appli 
cable  to  an  unsuccessful  result.  The  returning  army,  finding 
the  government  unprepared  to  satisfy  their  claims,  were  on  the 
point  of  mutinying  for  their  pay  ;  and  it  was  found  necessary 
to  issue  bills  of  credit,  which  the  troops  consented  to  accept 
in  place  of  money.  The  colony  was  now  in  a  very  depressed 
and  suffering  state.  Hoping  to  improve  (as  they  expressed 
themselves)  the  calamities  which  they  were  unable  to  evade, 
the  provincial  magistrates  endeavoured  to  promote  the  increase 
of  piety  and  the  reformation  of  manners  ;  and  pressed  upon 
the  ministers  and  the  people  the  duty  of  strongly  resisting  that 
worldliness  of  mind  which  the  necessity  of  contending  violent 
ly  for  temporal  interests  is  apt  to  engender.  The  attacks  of 
the  Indians  on  the  eastern  frontiers  were  attended  with  a  de 
gree  of  success  and  barbarity  that  diffused  general  terror  ;  and 
the  colonists  in  this  quarter  were  yielding  to  anticipations  of 
a  speedy  expulsion  from  their  settlements,  when,  all  at  once, 
the  savages,  of  their  own  accord,  proposed  a  peace  of  six 
months,  which  was  accepted  by  the  provincial  government  with 
great  willingness  and  devout  gratitude.  As  it  was  clearly  as 
certained  that  the  hostilities  of  the  Indians  were  continually 
fostered  by  the  intrigues,  and  rendered  the  more  formidable 
by  the  counsel  and  assistance,  of  the  French  authorities  in 
Canada,  the  people  of  New  England  began  to  regard  the  con 
quest  of  that  province  as  indispensable  to  their  safety  and  tran 
quillity.  With  the  hope  of  prevailing  on  the  king  to  sanction 
and  embrace  this  enterprise,  as  well  as  for  the  purpose  of  aid 
ing  the  other  deputies  in  the  no  less  interesting  application  for 
the  restoration  of  the  provincial  charter,  Sir  William  Phips, 
soon  after  his  return  from  Quebec,  by  desire  of  his  country 
men,  repaired  to  England.1 

In  the  discharge  of  the  duties  of  their  mission  [1691],  the 
deputies  employed  every  effort  that  patriotic  zeal  could  prompt, 
and  honorable  policy  admit,  to  obtain  satisfaction  to  their  con 
stituents,  by  the  punishment  of  their  oppressors,  and  the  resti- 

1  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Colden's  History  of  the  Five  Indian  Nations  of 
Canada. 

VOL.    I.  50 


394  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

tution  of  their  charter.  But  in  both  these  objects  their  en 
deavours  were  unsuccessful  ;  and  the  failure  was  generally 
(whether  justly  or  not)  ascribed  to  the  unbending  integrity  with 
which  Mather  and  Phips  rejected  every  art  and  intrigue  that 
seemed  inconsistent  with  the  honor  of  their  country.  It  was 
soon  discovered  that  the  king  and  his  ministers  were  averse  to 
an  inquiry  into  the  conduct  of  Andros  and  Randolph,  and  not 
less  so  to  the  restoration  of  the  ancient  charter  of  the  colony. 
The  conduct  of  the  British  court  on  this  occasion  presents  a 
confused  and  disgusting  picture  of  intrigue  and  duplicity.  The 
deputies  were  beset  by  a  multitude  of  importunate  counsellors, 
and  real  or  pretended  partisans  ;  —  some  doubtless  indiscreet, 
and  some  perhaps  insincere.  They  were  persuaded  by  certain 
of  their  advisers  to  present  to  the  privy  council  the  charges 
against  Andros  unsigned,  and  assured  by  others  that  in  so 
doing  they  had  cut  the  throat  of  their  country.  When  they 
attended  to  present  their  charges,  they  were  anticipated  by  An 
dros  and  Randolph,  who  came  prepared  with  a  charge  against 
the  colonists  of  resistance  to  the  authority  of  the  parent  state, 
and  rebellious  deposition  of  their  legitimate  governor.  Sir 
John  Somers,  the  lawyer  employed  by  the  deputies,  consent 
ed  that  they  should  abandon  the  situation  of  accusers  and  stand 
on  the  defensive  ;  and  he  tendered  the  unsigned  charges  as 
an  answer  to  the  accusations  of  Andros  and  Randolph.  The 
council  hesitated  to  receive  a  plea  presented  in  the  name  of  a 
whole  people,  and  required  that  some  individuals  should  ap 
pear  and  personally  avouch  it.  "  Who  was  it,"  said  the  Lord 
President,  "  that  imprisoned  Sir  Edmund  and  the  rest  ?  You 
say  it  was  the  country,  and  that  they  rose  as  one  man.  But 
that  is  nobody.  Let  us  see  the  persons  who  will  make  it 
their  own  case."  The  deputies  thereupon  offered  to  sign  the 
charges,  and  to  undertake  the  amplest  personal  responsibility 
for  the  acts  of  their  countrymen.  But  they  were  deterred 
from  this  proceeding  by  the  remonstrances  of  Sir  John  Som 
ers,  who  insisted  (for  reasons  that  have  never  been  satisfacto 
rily  explained)  on  persisting  in  the  course  in  which  they  had 
begun.  Some  of  the  counsellors  protested  against  the  injus 
tice  and  chicanery  of  encountering  the  complaint  of  a  whole 
nation  with  objections  so  narrow  and  technical.  "  Is  not  it 


CHAP.  V.]      SHUFFLING  POLICY  OF  WILLIAM  III.  395 

plain,"  they  urged,  "  that  the  revolution  in  Massachusetts  was 
carried  on  exactly  in  the  same  manner  as  the  revolution  in 
England  ?  Who  seized  and  imprisoned  Chancellor  Jeffries  ? 
Who  secured  the  garrison  of  Hull  ?  These  were  the  acts  of 
the  people,  and  not  of  private  individuals."  This  difference 
of  opinion  on  a  point  of  form  seems  to  have  been  the  object 
which  the  ministry  studied  to  promote.  Without  determining 
the  point,  the  council  interrupted  the  discussion  by  a  resolution 
that  the  whole  matter  should  be  referred  to  the  king  ;  and  his 
Majesty  soon  after  signified  his  pleasure  that  the  complaints  of 
both  parties  should  be  dismissed.1  [1691.]  Thus  terminated 
the  impeachment  of  Andros,  in  a  manner  very  ill  calculated  to 
impress  the  people  of  Massachusetts  with  respect  for  the  jus 
tice  of  the  British  government.  They  soon  after  had  the 
mortification  of  seeing  him  add  reward  to  impunity,  and  hon 
ored  with  the  appointment  of  governor  of  Virginia  and  Mary 
land.  They  had  previously  seen  Dudley,  whom  they  arrested 
and  sent  to  England  with  Andros,  appointed  chief  justice  of 
New  York,  where  he  condemned  to  death  the  unfortunate 
Leisler,  who  excited  the  first  revolutionary  movement  in  that 
colony  in  favor  of  King  William.2 

The  deputies,  finding  that  the  House  of  Commons,  though 
at  first  disposed  to  annul  the  judicial  decree  against  the  charter 
of  Massachusetts,  had  been  persuaded,  by  the  arguments  of 
Somers  and  other  lawyers  who  possessed  seats  in  the  house, 
to  depart  from  this  purpose,  and  that  the  king  was  resolved 
not  to  restore  the  old  charter,  employed  every  effort  to  obtain 
at  least  a  restitution  of  the  privileges  it  conferred.  But  Wil 
liam  and  his  ministers,  though  restrained  from  imitating  the 
tyrannical  measures  of  the  former  reign,  were  eager  and  de 
termined  to  avail  themselves  of  whatever  acquisitions  these 
measures  might  have  gained  to  the  royal  prerogative ;  and 
finding  that  the  crown  had  acquired  a  specious  legal  pretext 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson. 

2  Randolph  was  not  sent  back  to  America.      He  received,  however,  an  ap 
pointment  in  the  West  Indies,  where  he  died,  retaining,  it  is  said,  his  dislike 
of  the  people  of  New  England  to  the  last.     Eliot's  Biographical  Dictionary  of 
New  England.     Cranfield,  the  tyrant  of  New  Hampshire,  was  appointed  col 
lector  of  customs  at  Barbadoes.     He  repented  of  his  conduct  in  New  England, 
and  endeavoured  to  atone  for  it  by  showing  all  the  kindness  in  his  power  to 
the  New  England  traders  who  resorted  to  Barbadoes.     Belknap. 


396  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

to  exercise  much  greater  authority  over  the  colony  than  was 
reserved  in  its  original  constitution,  they  scrupled  not  to  take 
advantage  of  this  pretext,  without  regard  to  the  tyrannical  cast 
of  the  policy  by  which  it  had  been  obtained.  The  restoration 
of  their  ancient  privilege  of  electing  their  own  municipal  offi 
cers  was  ardently  desired  by  the  colonists,  and  demanded  by 
the  deputies  with  a  warmth  which  the  king  would  probably 
have  resented  as  disrespectful  to  himself,  if  he  had  not  felt 
himself  bound  to  excuse  the  irritation  provoked  by  his  own 
injustice.  In  vain  did  Archbishop  Tillotson  urge  him  not  to 
withhold  from  the  people  of  Massachusetts  the  full  measure 
of  those  privileges,  which,  even  under  the  arbitrary  sway  of 
Charles  the  First,  had  been  conceded  to  them.  He  adhered 
inflexibly  to  his  determination  of  retaining,  as  far  as  possible, 
every  advantage,  however  surreptitiously  acquired,  that  fortune 
had  put  into  his  hands  ;  and  at  length  a  new  charter  was  framed 
on  principles  that  widely  departed  from  the  primeval  constitu 
tion  of  the  colony,  and  transferred  to  the  crown  many  valuable 
privileges  that  originally  belonged  to  the  people.  [October  7, 
1691.] 

By  this  charter  the  territories  of  Massachusetts,  Plymouth, 
and  Maine,  together  with  the  conquered  province  of  Acadia, 
or  Nova  Scotia,  were  united  together  under  one  jurisdiction,  — 
an  arrangement  that  was  by  no  means  satisfactory  to  the  parties 
included  in  it  ;  for  Plymouth,  which  earnestly  solicited  a  sep 
arate  establishment,  was  forcibly  annexed  to  Massachusetts  ; 
and  New  Hampshire,  which  as  earnestly  petitioned  to  be  in 
cluded  in  this  annexation,  was  made  a  separate  province.1  The 
appointment  of  the  governor,  deputy-governor,  secretary,  and 
all  the  officers  of  the  admiralty  was  reserved  to  the  crown. 
Twenty-eight  counsellors  were  directed  to  be  chosen  by  the 
house  of  assembly,  and  presented  to  the  governor  for  his  ap 
probation.  The  governor  was  empowered  to  convoke,  ad- 

1  The  union  so  much  desired  by  the  people  of  Massachusetts  and  New 
Hampshire  was  overruled  by  the  interest  and  for  the  convenience  of  Samuel 
Allen,  a  merchant  in  London,  to  whom  Mason's  heirs  had  sold  their  claim  to 
the  soil  of  New  Hampshire.  He  was  appointed  the  first  governor  of  the 
province  ;  and,  employing  his  authority  in  vexatious,  but  unsuccessful,  attempts 
to  extract  pecuniary  profit  from  his  purchased  claim,  rendered  himself  ex 
tremely  odious  to  the  people.  Belknap.  He  was  superseded  in  the  office  of 
governor  by  Lord  Bellamont,  in  1698. 


CHAP.  V.]   NEW  CHARTER  OF  MASSACHUSETTS.       397 

journ,  prorogue,  and  dissolve  the  assembly  at  pleasure  ;  to 
nominate,  exclusively,  all  military  officers,  and  (with  consent 
of  the  council)  all  the  judges  and  other  officers  of  the  law. 
To  the  governor  was  reserved  a  negative  on  the  laws  and  acts 
of  the  general  assembly  and  council ;  and  all  laws  enacted  by 
these  bodies  and  approved  by  the  governor  were  to  be  trans 
mitted  to  England  for  the  royal  approbation  ;  and  if  disallowed 
within  the  space  of  three  years,  they  were  to  become  abso 
lutely  void.  Liberty  of  conscience  and  of  divine  worship, 
which  had  not  been  mentioned  in  the  old  charter,  was,  by  the 
present  one,  expressly  assured  to  all  persons  except  Roman 
Catholics.1 

The  innovations  thus  introduced  into  their  ancient  munici 
pal  constitution  excited  much  discontent  in  the  minds  of  the 
people  of  Massachusetts  ;  the  more  especially  because  the 
enlargement  of  royal  authority  was  not  attended  with  a  propor 
tional  communication  of  the  royal  protection.  At  the  very 
time  when  the  king  thus  extended  the  limits  of  his  prerogative 
at  the  expense  of  popular  liberty,  he  found  himself  constrained, 
by  the  urgency  of  his  affairs  in  Europe,  to  refuse  the  assist 
ance  which  the  people  besought  from  him  to  repel  the  hostili 
ties  of  the  Indians  and  of  the  French  forces  in  Canada.  The 
situation  of  the  provinces  of  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island, 
which  were  permitted  to  reassume  all  their  ancient  privileges, 
rendered  the  injustice  with  which  Massachusetts  was  treated 
more  flagrant  and  irritating.  Though  legal  technicalities  might 
be  thought  by  lawyers  and  special  pleaders  to  warrant  the 
advantageous  distinction  which  those  States  enjoyed,  a  con 
clusion  so  illiberal  was  utterly  repugnant  to  the  enlarged  views 
of  justice  and  equity  which  ought  to  regulate  the  policy  of  a 
legislator.  Only  mistake  on  the  one  side,  or  artifice  on  the 

1  Mather,  Life  of  Sir  William  Phips.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Belknap.  Ban 
croft.  "  That  charter  effected  in  Massachusetts  as  perfect  and  thorough  a 
revolution  as  ever  was  produced  by  a  similar  act  in  any  state  or  nation.  It 
changed  not  only  the  form  of  the  government  and  the  relations  of  power  among 
the  people,  but  also  the  entire  foundation  and  objects  of  the  government.  By 
making  freehold  and  property,  instead  of  church-membership,  the  qualification 
of  the  right  of  electing  and  being  elected  to  office,  religion  became  no  longer 
the  end  and  object  of  the  civil  government."  Quincy's  History  of  Harvard 
University.  This  change  was  for  a  while  disguised  by  the  coincidence  be 
tween  the  sentiments  of  the  first  boards  of  new  magistrates  and  the  ancient 
system  of  municipal  polity. 


398  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

other,  could  be  supposed  to  have  procured  to  Connecticut  and 
Rhode  Island  an  advantage  that  made  the  treatment  of  Mas 
sachusetts  more  invidious  ;  and  a  dangerous  lesson  was  taught 
to  the  colonial  communities,  when  they  were  thus  given  to 
understand  that  it  was  their  own  vigilant  dexterity  and  success 
ful  intrigue,  or  the  blunders  of  the  parent  state,  that  they  were 
to  rely  on  as  the  safeguards  of  their  rights.  The  injustice  of 
the  policy  now  applied  to  Massachusetts  was  rendered  still 
more  glaringly  apparent  by  the  very  different  treatment  ob 
tained  by  the  powerful  corporation  of  the  city  of  London, 
whose  charter,  though  annulled  with  the  same  legal  formality 
and  on  grounds  as  plausible  as  the  ancient  charter  of  Massa 
chusetts,  was  restored  by  a  legislative  act  immediately  after 
the  Revolution.  Nor  was  any  real  political  advantage  obtained 
by  the  English  government  from  its  violation  of  just  and  equi 
table  principles.  The  power  that  was  wrested  from  the  colo 
nists  and  appropriated  by  the  crown  was  quite  inadequate  to 
the  formation  of  an  efficient  royal  party  in  the  province.  The 
usurped  prerogative  of  nominating  the  governor  and  other 
officers  was  regarded  as  a  badge  of  dependence,  instead  of 
forming  a  bond  of  union.  The  popular  assemblies  retained 
sufficient  influence  over  the  governors  to  curb  them  in  the 
administration  of  an  illiberal  policy,  and  sufficient  power  to 
restrain  them  from  making  any  serious  inroad  on  the  constitu 
tion.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  the  dissensions  between  the 
two  countries,  which  eventually  terminated  in  the  dissolution 
of  the  British  empire  in  America,  were  not  a  little  promoted 
by  the  pernicious  counsels  and  erroneous  information  conveyed 
to  the  English  ministry  by  the  governors  of  those  provinces 
in  which  the  appointment  to  that  office  was  exercised  by  the 
king. 

Aware  of  the  dissatisfaction  with  which  the  new  charter  was 
regarded,  the  ministers  of  William  judged  it  prudent  to  waive 
in  the  outset  the  full  exercise  of  the  invidious  prerogative,  and 
desired  the  provincial  deputies  to  name  the  person  whom  they 
considered  most  likely  to  be  acceptable  to  their  countrymen 
as  governor  of  Massachusetts  ;  and  the  deputies  having  united 
in  recommending  Sir  William  Phips,  the  appointment  to  this 
office  was  bestowed  on  him  accordingly.  This  act  of  courtesy 


CHAP.  V.]    ADMINISTRATION  OF  SIR  WILLIAM  PHIPS.       399 

was  attended  with  a  degree  of  success  in  mollifying  the  ill- 
humor  of  the  people,  that  attests  the  high  estimation  in  which 
Phips  was  held  by  his  countrymen  ;  for  on  his  arrival  at 
Boston  [May,  1692],  though  some  discontent  was  betrayed, 
and  several  of  the  members  of  the  General  Court  warmly 
insisted  that  the  new  charter  should  be  absolutely  rejected,1 
yet  the  great  body  of  the  people  received  him  with  acclama 
tions  ;  and  a  majority  of  the  General  Court  resolved  that  the 
charter  should  be  heartily  accepted,  and  appointed  a  day  of 
thanksgiving  for  the  safe  arrival  of  their  worthy  governor  and 
of  Increase  Mather,  whose  services  they  acknowledged  with 
grateful  commemoration.  The  new  governor  hastened  to  ap 
prove  himself  worthy  of  the  favorable  regard  thus  expressed 
for  him.  Having  convoked  the  General  Court  of  the  province, 
he  addressed  the  members  in  a  short,  characteristic  speech, 
recommending  to  them  the  composition  of  a  code  of  good  laws 
with  all  the  expedition  they  could  exert.  "  Gentlemen,"  said 
he,  "  you  may  make  yourselves  as  easy  as  you  will  for  ever. 
Consider  what  may  have  a  tendency  to  your  welfare  ;  and  you 
may  be  sure  that  whatever  bills  you  offer  to  me,  consistent 
with  the  honor  and  interest  of  the  crown,  I  '11  pass  them  read 
ily.  I  do  but  seek  opportunities  to  serve  you.  Had  it  not 
been  for  the  sake  of  this  thing,  I  had  never  accepted  of  this 
office.  And  whenever  you  have  settled  such  a  body  of  good 
laws,  that  no  person  coming  after  me  may  make  you  uneasy, 
I  shall  desire  not  one  day  longer  to  continue  in  the  govern 
ment."  His  conduct  seems  in  general  to  have  corresponded 
with  these  professions.2 

And   yet,    the   administration   of  Sir  William   Phips   was 
neither  long  nor  prosperous.     Though  he  might  give  his  sanc- 

1  Mather  and  the  other  deputies,  when  they  found  it  impossible  to  obtain 
an  alteration  of  the  new  charter,  proposed  at  first  to  reject  it  altogether,  and 
to  institute  a  process  for  trying  the  validity  of  the  judgment  pronounced  on 
the  quo  warranto.     They  were  deterred  from  this  proceeding  by  the  solemn 
assurance  of  Treby,  Somers,  and  the  two  chief  justices  of  England  (Holt  and 
Pollexfen),  that,  ir  the  judgment  were  reversed,  a  new  quo  warranto  would  be 
issued,  and  inevitably  followed  by  a  sentence  exempt  from  all  ground  of  chal 
lenge.     These  learned  persons  assured  the  deputies,  that  the  colonists,  by 
erecting  judicatories,  constituting  a  house  of  representatives,  and  incorporating 
colleges,  had  forfeited  their  charter,  which  gave  no  sanction  to  such  acts  of 
authority.  —  Hutchinson. 

2  Mather,  Life  of  Phips.    Neal.    Hutchinson. 


400  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

tion  as  governor  to  popular  laws,  it  was  not  in  his  power  to 
prevent  them  from  being  rescinded  by  the  crown  ;  and  this 
fate  soon  befell  a  law  that  was  passed  by  the  provincial  assem 
bly,  declaring  the  colonists  exempt  from  all  taxes  but  such  as 
should  be  imposed  by  their  own  representatives,  and  asserting 
their  right  to  share  all  the  privileges  of  Magna  Charta.  He 
found  the  province  involved  in  a  distressing  war  with  the 
French  and  Indians,  and  in  the  still  more  formidable  calamity 
of  that  delusion  which  has  been  termed  the  JVew  England 
witchcraft.  When  the  Indians  were  informed  of  the  elevation 
of  Sir  William  Phips  to  the  office  of  governor  of  Massa 
chusetts,  they  were  struck  with  amazement  at  the  fortunes  of 
the  man  whose  humble  origin  they  perfectly  well  knew,  and 
with  whom  they  had  familiarly  associated  but  a  few  years  be 
fore  in  the  obscurity  of  his  primitive  condition.  Impressed 
with  a  high  opinion  of  his  courage  and  resolution,  and  a  super 
stitious  dread  of  that  fortune  that  seemed  destined  to  surmount 
every  obstacle  and  prevail  over  every  disadvantage,  they  would 
willingly  have  made  peace  with  him  and  his  countrymen,  but 
were  induced  to  continue  the  war  by  the  artifices  and  intrigues 
of  the  French.  A  few  months  after  his  arrival,  the  governor, 
at  the  head  of  a  small  army,  marched  to  Pemmaquid,  on  the 
Merrimack  River,  and  there  caused  to  be  erected  a  fort  of 
considerable  strength,  and  calculated  by  its  situation  to  form  a 
powerful  barrier  to  the  province,  and  to  overawe  the  neigh 
bouring  tribes  of  Indians,  and  interrupt  their  mutual  commu 
nication. 

The  beneficial  effect  of  this  operation  was  experienced  in 
the  following  year  [1693],  when  the  Indians  sent  ambassadors 
to  the  fort  at  Pemmaquid,  and  there  concluded  with  English 
commissioners  a  treaty  of  peace,  by  which  they  renounced  for 
ever  the  interests  of  the  French,  and  pledged  themselves  to 
perpetual  amity  with  the  inhabitants  of  New  England.1  The 
colonists,  who  had  suffered  severely  from  the  recent  depre 
dations  of  these  savages,2  and  were  still  laboring  under  the 

1  Neal.     Hutchinson. 

*  The  situation  of  the  people  of  New  Hampshire,  in  particular,  had  become 
so  irksome  and  dangerous,  that  at  one  time  they  entertained  the  purpose  of 
abandoning  the  province.  Belknap.  When  Adam  Smith  declared  that 
"  nothing  can  be  more  contemptible  than  an  Indian  war  in  North  America," 


CHAP.V.]  THE  WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  401 

burdens  entailed  on  them  by  former  wars,  were  not  slow  to 
embrace  the  first  overtures  of  peace  ;  and  yet  they  murmured 
with  great  discontent  and  ill-humor  at  the  measure  to  which 
they  were  principally  indebted  for  the  deliverance  they  had  so 
ardently  desired.  The  expense  of  building  the  fort,  and  of 
maintaining  its  garrison  and  stores,  occasioned  an  addition  to 
the  existing  taxes,  which  provoked  their  impatience.  The 
party  who  had  opposed  submission  to  the  new  charter  eagerly 
promoted  every  complaint  against  the  conduct  of  a  system 
which  they  regarded  with  rooted  aversion  ;  and  labored  so 
successfully  on  this  occasion  to  vilify  the  person  and  govern 
ment  of  Sir  William  Phips  in  the  eyes  of  his  countrymen, 
that  his  popularity  sustained  a  shock  from  which  it  never  after 
wards  entirely  recovered.  The  people  were  easily  persuaded 
to  regard  the  increase  of  taxation  as  the  effect  of  the  recent 
abridgment  of  their  political  privileges,  and  to  believe,  that,  if 
they  had  retained  their  ancient  control  over  the  officers  of  gov 
ernment,  the  administration  of  their  affairs  would  have  been 
more  economically  conducted.  But  another  cause,  which  we 
have  already  cursorily  remarked,  and  must  now  more  atten 
tively  consider,  rendered  the  minds  of  the  colonists  at  this 
time  unusually  susceptible  of  gloomy  impressions,  and  of  sus 
picions  equally  irritating  and  unreasonable.  [1693.] 

The  belief  of  witchcraft  was  at  this  period  almost  universal 
in  Christian  countries  ;  and  the  existence  and  criminality  of 
the  practice  were  recognized  in  the  penal  code  of  every  civil 
ized  state.  Persons  suspected  of  being  witches  and  wizards 
were  frequently  tried,  condemned,  and  put  to  death  by  the 
authority  of  the  most  enlightened  tribunals  in  Europe  ;  and,  in 

he  alluded  to  a  period  much  later  than  this,  and  in  which  the  proportion  be 
tween  the  numbers  of  the  savage  and  civilized  races  had  undergone  a  great 
alteration.  Even  then,  the  observation  was  just  only  in  so  far  as  respected 
apprehensions  of  conquest ;  for  no  hostilities  were  ever  more  fraught  with 
cruelty,  misery,  and  horror,  than  those  of  the  North  American  Indians.  When 
Chalmers  pronounced  the  Indians  "  a  foe  that  has  never  proved  dangerous, 
except  to  the  effeminate,  the  factious,  and  the  cowardly,"  he  was  transported 
into  this  injustice  by  the  desire  of  lowering  the  reputation  of  the  people  of 
New  Hampshire, —  a  portion  of  the  American  population  who  seem  to  have 
provoked  in  a  peculiar  degree  his  spleen  and  malevolence.  New  Hampshire 
has  been  more  justly  characterized  oy  an  American  historian  as  "  a  nursery  of 
stern  heroism  ;  producing  men  of  firmness  and  valor,  who  can  traverse  moun 
tains  and  deserts,  encounter  hardships,  and  face  an  enemy  without  terror." 
Belknap. 

VOL.    I.  51 


402  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

particular,  but  a  few  years  before  the  present  epoch,  Sir 
Matthew  Hale,  a  man  highly  and  justly  renowned  for  the 
strength  of  his  understanding,  the  variety  of  his  knowledge, 
and  the  eminent  Christian  graces  that  adorned  his  character, 
after  a  long  and  anxious  investigation,  adjudged  a  number  of 
men  and  women  to  die  for  this  offence  at  an  assize  in  Suffolk.1 
The  reality  of  witchcraft  had  never  yet  been  questioned  ;  nor 
were  there  any  individuals  to  whom  that  reality  appeared  un 
important  or  incredible,  except  those  who  regarded  the  spirit 
ual  world  altogether  as  a  mere  speculation  of  visionary  fancy, 
and  delusive.  Among  other  believers  in  the  practice  were 
some  of  the  unfortunate  beings  themselves  who  were  put  to 
death  as  witches.  Instigated  by  fraud,  folly,  or  malignity,  or 
possessed  by  demoniacal  frenzy,  some  of  these  unhappy  per 
sons  professed,  more  or  less  openly,  to  hold  communication 
with  the  powers  of  darkness  ;  and  by  the  administration  of 
subtle  poisons,  by  disturbing  the  imagination  of  their  victims, 
or  by  an  actual  appropriation  of  that  unhallowed  agency 
which  Scripture  assures  us  did  once  operate  in  the  world,  and 
of  which  no  equal  authority  has  ever  proclaimed  the  extinc 
tion,  they  committed  crimes  and  inflicted  injuries  which  were 
punished,  doubtless  sometimes,  perhaps  frequently,  under  an 
erroneous  name. 

The  colonists  of  New  England,  participating  in  the  general 
belief  of  this  practice,  regarded  it  with  a  degree  of  abhorrence 
and  indignation  corresponding  to  the  piety  for  which  they  were 
so  remarkably  distinguished.  Their  experience  in  America 
had  tended  to  strengthen  the  sentiments  on  this  subject  which 
they  brought  with  them  from  Europe  ;  for  they  found  the  be 
lief  of  witchcraft  firmly  rooted  among  the  Indian  tribes,  and 
the  practice  (or  what  was  so  termed  and  esteemed)  prevailing 
extensively,  and  with  perfect  impunity,  among  those  people, 

1  Howell's  State  Trials.  Even  so  late  as  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  cen 
tury,  the  conviction  of  the  witches  of  Warbois,  in  the  reign  of  Q,ueen  Eliza 
beth,  was  still  commemorated  in  an  annual  sermon  at  Huntingdon.  John 
son's  Works,  Observations  on  the  Tragedy  of  Macbeth.  The  seceders  from  the 
established  church  in  Scotland  published  an  act  of  their  associate  presbytery 
at  Edinburgh,  in  1743  (reprinted  at  Glasgow  in  1766),  denouncing  the  repeal 
of  the  penal  laws  against  witchcraft  as  a  national  sin.  Arnot's  Criminal 
Trials  in  Scotland. 

The  last  executions  for  witchcraft  in  the  British  dominions  were  at  Hun 
tingdon  in  1716,  and  in  Sutherlandshire  in  1722.  —  Arnot. 


CHAP.  V.]  THE  WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  403 

whom,  as  heathens,  they  regarded  as  the  worshippers  of  de 
mons.1  Their  conviction  of  the  reality  of  witchcraft,  was,  not 
unreasonably,  confirmed  by  such  evidence  of  the  universal  as 
sent  of  mankind  ;  and  their  resentment  of  its  enormity  was 
proportionally  increased  by  the  honor  and  acceptance  which 
they  saw  it  enjoy  under  the  shelter  of  superstitions  that  denied 
and  dishonored  the  true  God.  The  first  trials  for  witchcraft 
in  New  England  occurred  in  the  year  1645,  when  four  persons 
charged  with  this  crime  were  put  to  death  in  Massachusetts. 
Goffe,  the  regicide,  in  his  Diary,  records  the  conviction  of 
three  others  at  Hartford,  in  Connecticut,  in  1662,  and  remarks, 
that,  after  one  of  them  was  hanged,  a  young  woman,  who  had 
been  bewitched,  was  restored  to  health.  For  more  than  twenty 
years  after,  few  instances  occurred,  and  little  notice  has  been 
preserved  of  similar  prosecutions.  But  in  the  year  1688,  a 
woman  was  executed  for  witchcraft  at  Boston,  after  an  investi 
gation  conducted  with  a  degree  of  solemnity  that  made  a  deep 
impression  on  the  minds  of  the  people.  An  account  of  the 
whole  transaction  was  published  ;  and  so  generally  were  the 
wise  and  good  persuaded  of  the  justice  of  the  proceeding,  that 
Richard  Baxter,  the  celebrated  Non-conformist  divine,  wrote 
a  preface  to  the  narrative,  in  which  he  scrupled  not  to  declare 
every  one  who  refused  to  believe  it  an  obdurate  Sadducee. 
The  attention  of  the  people  being  thus  strongly  excited,  and 
their  suspicions  awakened  and  attracted  in  this  dangerous  di 
rection,  the  charges  of  witchcraft  became  gradually  more  fre 
quent,  till,  at  length,  there  commenced  at  Salem  that  dreadful 
tragedy  which  rendered  New  England  for  many  months  a  scene 
of  bloodshed,  terror,  and  madness. 

In  the  beginning  of  the  year  1692,  Massachusetts  was  visit 
ed  with  an  epidemical  complaint  resembling  epilepsy,  which 
the  physicians,  unable  to  explain  or  cure,  readily  imputed  to 
supernatural  operation.  Some  young  women,  and  among  others 
the  daughter  and  niece  of  Paris,  the  minister  of  Salem  village, 
were  first  attacked  by  this  distemper,  and  induced  by  the  sug 
gestions  of  their  medical  attendants  to  ascribe  it  to  withcraft. 

1  Hubbard,  a  Puritan  minister,  and  one  of  the  earliest  historians  of  New 
England,  cites  with  approbation  the  opinion  of  a  Mr.  Mede,  that  America  was 
originally  peopled  by  a  crew  of  witches,  transported  thither  by  the  devil.  — 
Collections  of  the  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society,  Vol.  III. 


404  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

The  delusion  was  encouraged  by  a  perverted  application  of 
the  means  best  fitted  to  strengthen  and  enlighten  the  under 
standing.  Solemn  fasts  were  observed,  and  assemblies  con 
voked  for  extraordinary  prayer  ;  and  the  supposition  of  witch 
craft,  which  in  reality  had  been  previously  assumed,  was  thus 
confirmed  and  consecrated  in  the  apprehension  of  the  public. 
The  imaginations  of  the  patients,  disturbed  by  morbid  sensa 
tion,  and  inflamed  by  the  contagious  terror  which  their  sup 
posed  malady  excited,  readily  prompted  accusations  against  par 
ticular  individuals  as  the  authors  of  the  calamity.  The  flame 
was  now  kindled,  and  finding  ample  nourishment  in  all  the 
strongest  passions  and  most  inveterate  weaknesses  of  human 
nature,  carried  havoc  and  destruction  through  the  community. 
The  bodily  symptoms  of  the  prevailing  epidemic,  frequently 
pondered  by  timorous  and  susceptible  persons,  were  propagated 
with  amazing  rapidity  ;  and  having  been  once  regarded  as 
symptoms  of  witchcraft,  were  ever  after  referred  to  the  same 
diabolical  origin.  The  usual  and  well  known  contagion  of  ner 
vous  disorders  was  quickened  by  dread  of  the  horrid  and  mys 
terious  agency  from  which  they  were  now  supposed  to  arise ; 
and  this  appalling  dread,  enfeebling  the  reason  of  its  victims, 
led  them  to  confound  the  visions  of  their  disturbed  apprehen 
sion  with  the  realities  of  sound  experience.  To  think  earnest 
ly  upon  any  thing  implies  its  influence  and  engraves  its  pres 
ence  on  the  mind  ;  and  to  dread  it  is  partly  to  realize  and 
still  farther  to  invite  its  dominion.  Symptoms  before  unheard 
of,  and  unusually  terrific,1  attended  the  cases  of  the  sufferers, 
and  were  supposed  to  prove  beyond  a  doubt  that  the  disorder 
was  no  natural  ailment  ;  while,  in  truth,  they  denoted  nothing 
else  than  the  extraordinary  terror  of  the  unhappy  patients,  who 

1  Swelling  of  the  throat,  in  particular,  now  well  known  to  be  a  symptom  of 
hysterical  affection,  was  considered  at  that  time  a  horrible  prodigy.  Medical 
science  was  still  depraved  by  an  admixture  of  gross  superstition.  The  touch 
of  a  king  was  believed  to  be  capable  of  curing  some  diseases  ;  and  astrology 
formed  a  part  of  the  course  of  medical  study,  because  the  efficacy  of  drugs  was 
believed  to  be  promoted  or  impeded  by  planetary  influence.  "  In  conse 
quence  of  the  greater  nervous  irritability  of  women,"  says  Dugald  Stewart, 
"  their  muscular  system  seems  to  possess  a  greater  degree  of  that  mobility  by 
which  the  principle  of  sympathetic  imitation  operates."  The  first  and  the 
most  numerous  of  the  supposed  victims  of  witcncrafl  in  New  England  were 
young  women.  It  is  not  improbable,  that,  in  some  cases,  the  other  morbid 
symptoms  were  complicated  with  the  mysterious  phenomena  of  somnambu 
lism. 


CHAP.  V.]  THE  WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  405 

augmented  the  malignity  of  their  disease  by  the  darkness  and 
horror  of  the  source  to  which  they  traced  it.  Every  case  of 
nervous  derangement  was  now  referred  to  this  source,  and 
every  morbid  affection  of  the  spirits  and  fancy  diverted  into 
the  most  dangerous  channel.  Accusations  of  particular  indi 
viduals  easily  suggested  themselves  to  the  disordered  minds  of 
the  sufferers,  and  were  eagerly  preferred  by  themselves  and 
their  relatives,  in  the  hope  of  obtaining  deliverance  from  the 
calamity  by  the  punishment  of  its  guilty  authors. 

These  charges,  however  unsupported  by  proof,  and  how 
ever  remote  from  probability,  alighted  with  fatal  influence 
wherever  they  fell.  The  supernatural  intimation,  by  which 
they  were  supposed  to  be  dictated,  supplied  and  excluded  all 
ordinary  proof;  and  when  a  patient,  under  the  dominion  of 
nervous  affections,  or  in  the  intervals  of  epileptic  paroxysms, 
declared  that  he  had  seen  the  apparition  of  a  particular  individ 
ual  occasioning  his  sufferings,  no  consideration  of  previously 
unblemished  character  could  screen  the  accused  from  a  trial, 
which,  if  the  patient  persisted  in  the  charge,  invariably  termi 
nated  in  a  conviction.  The  charges  were  frequently  admitted 
without  any  other  proof,  for  the  very  reason  for  which  they 
should  have  been  absolutely  rejected  by  human  tribunals,  — 
that  their  truth  was  judged  incapable  of  ordinary  proof,  or  of 
being  known  to  any  but  the  accuser  and  the  accused.  So  gen 
eral  and  inveterate  was  the  belief  in  the  reality  of  the  supposed 
witchcraft,  that  no  one  dared  openly  to  gainsay  it,  whatever 
might  really  be  his  opinion  on  the  subject ;  and  the  innocent  vic 
tims  of  the  charges  were  constrained  to  argue  on  the  assumption, 
that  the  apparitions  of  themselves,  described  by  their  accusers, 
had  actually  been  seen,  —  and  reduced  to  plead  that  their  sem 
blance  was  assumed  by  an  evil  spirit  that  sought  to  screen  his 
proper  instruments,  and  divert  the  public  indignation  upon  un 
offending  persons.  It  was  maintained,  however,  by  Stoughton, 
the  deputy-governor  of  Massachusetts,  most  gratuitously,  but, 
unhappily,  to  the  conviction  of  the  public,  that  an  evil  spirit 
could  sustain  only  the  appearance  of  such  persons  as  had  given 
up  their  bodies  to  him  and  devoted  themselves  to  his  service. 
The  semblance  of  legal  proof,  besides,  was  very  soon  added 
to  the  force  of  those  charges  ;  and  seeming  to  put  their  truth 


406  HISTORY  OF    NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

past  doubt  in  some  cases,  was  thought  to  confirm  it  in  all. 
Some  of  the  accused,  terrified  by  their  danger,  sought  safety 
in  avowing  their  guilt,  recanting  their  supposed  impiety,  and 
denouncing  others  as  their  tempters  and  associates.  In  order 
to  beget  favor  and  verify  their  recantation,  they  now  declared 
themselves  the  victims  of  the  witchcraft  they  had  formerly 
practised,  counterfeited  the  nervous  affections  of  their  own  ac 
cusers,  and  imputed  their  sufferings  to  the  vengeance  of  their 
ancient  accomplices. 

These  artifices  and  the  general  delusion  were  promoted  by 
the  conduct  of  the  magistrates,  who,  with  a  monstrous  inversion 
of  equity  and  sound  sense,  offered  impunity  to  all  who  would 
confess  the  imputed  crime  and  betray  their  associates,  while 
they  inflexibly  doomed  to  death  every  accused  person  who 
maintained  his  innocence.  Thus  one  accusation  produced  a 
multitude  of  others,  —  the  accused  becoming  accusers  and  wit 
nesses,  and  hastening  to  escape  from  danger  by  fastening  the 
guilt  on  other  persons.  From  Salem,  where  its  main  fury  was 
exerted,  the  evil  spread  over  the  whole  province  of  Massachu 
setts  ;  and  wherever  it  was  able  to  penetrate,  it  effectually  sub 
verted  the  happiness  and  security  of  life.  The  sword  of  the 
law  was  wrested  from  the  hand  of  dispassionate  justice,  and 
committed  to  the  grasp  of  the  wildest  fear  and  fury,  while  the 
shield  of  the  law  was  denied  to  the  unfortunate  objects  of  these 
headlong  and  dangerous  passions.  Alarm  and  terror  pervaded 
all  ranks  of  society.  The  first  and  the  favorite  objects  of  ar 
raignment  were  ill-favored  old  women,  whose  dismal  aspect, 
exciting  horror  and  aversion  instead  of  tenderness  and  compas 
sion,  was  reckoned  a  proof  of  their  guilt,  and  seemed  to  desig 
nate  the  appropriate  agents  of  mysterious  and  unearthly  wick 
edness.  But  the  sphere  of  accusation  was  progressively  en 
larged  to  such  a  degree,  that  at  length  neither  age  nor  sex, 
neither  ignorance  nor  innocence,  neither  learning  nor  piety, 
neither  reputation  nor  office,  could  afford  the  slightest  safe 
guard  against  a  charge  of  witchcraft.  Even  irrational  creatures 
were  not  exempted  from  this  fatal  charge  ;  and  a  dog,  belong 
ing  to  a  person  accused  of  witchcraft,  was  hanged  as  the  ac 
complice  of  a  crime  which  the  poor  brute  was  alike  incapable 
of  confessing,  denying,  or  comprehending.  Under  the  domin- 


CHAP.  V.]  THE   WITCHCRAFT   DELUSION.  407 

ion  of  terror,  all  mutual  confidence  was  destroyed,  and  the 
kindest  feelings  of  human  nature  were  trampled  under  foot. 
The  nearest  relations  became  each  other's  accusers  ;  and  one 
unhappy  man,  in  particular,  was  condemned  and  executed  on 
the  testimony  of  his  wife  and  daughter,  who  impeached  him 
merely  with  the  view  of  preserving  themselves.  Many  re 
spectable  persons  fled  from  the  colony  ;  others,  maintaining 
their  innocence,  were  capitally  convicted,  and  died  with  a  se 
rene  courage  and  piety,  that  affected,  but  could  not  disabuse, 
the  spectators. 

The  accounts  that  have  been  preserved  of  the  trials  of  these 
unfortunate  persons  present  a  most  revolting  and  humiliating 
picture  of  frenzy,  folly,  and  injustice.  In  support  of  the  charge 
of  witchcraft  against  some  of  the  prisoners,  the  court  permitted 
testimony  to  be  given  of  losses  and  mishaps  that  had  befallen 
the  accusers  or  their  cattle  (even  as  long  as  twenty  years  be 
fore  the  trial),  after  some  meeting  or  some  disagreement  be 
tween  them  and  the  prisoners.  Against  others  it  was  deposed, 
that  they  had  performed  greater  feats  of  strength,  and  walked 
from  one  place  to  another  in  a  shorter  space  of  time,  than  the 
accusers  judged  possible  without  diabolical  assistance.  But 
the  main  article  of  proof  was  the  spectral  apparitions  of  the 
persons  of  the  pretended  witches  to  the  eyes  of  their  supposed 
victims  during  the  paroxysms  of  their  malady.  The  accusers 
sometimes  declared  that  they  could  not  see  the  prisoners  at 
the  bar  of  the  court ;  which  was  construed  into  a  proof  of  the 
immediate  exertion  of  Satanic  influence  in  rendering  the  per 
sons  of  the  culprits  invisihle  to  those  who  were  to  testify 
against  them.  The  bodies  of  the  prisoners  were  commonly 
examined  for  the  discovery  of  what  were  termed  witch-marks  ; 
and  as  the  examiners  did  >  not  know  what  they  were  seeking 
for,  and  yet  earnestly  desired  to  find  it,  every  little  puncture 
or  discoloration  of  the  skin  was  easily  believed  to  be  the  im 
press  of  infernal  touch.  In  general,  the  accusers  fell  into  fits, 
or  complained  of  violent  uneasiness,  at  the  sight  of  the  prison 
ers.  On  the  trial  of  Burroughs,  a  clergyman  of  the  highest 
respectability,  some  of  the  witnesses  being  affected  in  this 
manner,  the  judges  replied  to  his  protestations  of  innocence 
by  asking  if  he  would  venture  to  deny  that  these  persons  were 


408  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

then  laboring  under  the  malignant  influence  of  the  powers  of 
hell.  He  answered,  that  he  did  not  deny  it,  but  that  he  denied 
having  any  concern  with  it.  "  If  you  were  not  a  friend  of  the 
devil,"  replied  the  presiding  judge,  "  he  would  not  exert  him 
self  in  this  manner  to  prevent  these  persons  from  speaking 
against  you."  When  a  prisoner  in  his  defence  uttered  any 
thing  that  seemed  to  move  the  audience  in  his  favor,  some  of 
the  accusers  were  ready  to  exclaim  that  they  saw  the  devil 
standing  by  and  putting  the  words  in  his  mouth  ;  and  every 
feeling  of  humanity  was  chased  away  by  such  absurd  and  fran 
tic  exclamations.  While  one  of  the  convicts,  at  the  foot  of 
the  scaffold,  was  addressing  a  last  assurance  of  his  innocence 
to  the  spectators,  the  executioner  sat  by  him  smoking  tobacco ; 
and  some  of  the  smoke  having  been  wafted  by  the  wind  into 
the  eyes  of  the  dying  man,  the  accusers  thereupon  set  up  a 
shout  of  brutal  triumph,  and  exclaimed,  "  See  how  the  devil 
wraps  him  in  smoke  !  "  It  cannot  be  doubted  that  fraud  and 
malignity  had  a  share  in  inciting  these  prosecutions. 

The  principle  that  was  practically  avowed  in  the  courts  of 
justice,  that,  in  cases  of  witchcraft,  accusation  was  equivalent 
to  conviction,  presented  the  most  subtle  and  powerful  allure 
ments  to  the  indulgence  of  natural  ferocity  and  the  gratifica 
tion  of  fantastic  terror  and  suspicion  ;  and  there  is  but  too 
much  reason  to  believe  that  rapacity,  malice,  and  revenge 
were  not  vainly  invited  to  seize  this  opportunity  of  satiating 
their  appetites  in  confiscation  and  bloodshed.  So  strong, 
meanwhile,  was  the  popular  delusion,  that  even  the  detection 
of  manifest  perjury,  on  one  of  the  trials,  proved  insufficient  to 
weaken  the  credit  of  the  most  unsupported  accusation.  Sir 
William  Phips,  the  governor,  Stoughton,  the  lieutenant-gov 
ernor,  and  the  most  learned  and  eminent  persons,  both  among 
the  clergy  and  laity  of  the  province,  partook  and  promoted 
the  general  infatuation.  Nothing  but  an  outrageous  zeal  against 
witchcraft  seemed  capable  of  assuring  any  individual  of  the 
safety  of  his  life  ;  and  temptations,  that  but  too  frequently  over 
powered  human  courage  and  virtue,  arose  from  the  conviction 
impressed  on  every  person  that  there  remained  no  other  alter 
native  than  that  of  becoming  the  oppressor  or  the  oppressed. 
The  afflicted  (as  the  accusers  were  termed)  and  their  witnesses 


CHAP.  V.]  THE   WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  409 

and  partisans  began  to  form  a  numerous  and  united  party  in 
every  community,  which  none  dared  to  oppose,  and  which 
none  who  once  joined  or  supported  it  could  forsake  with  impu 
nity.  A  magistrate,  who  for  a  while  took  an  active  part  in  ex 
amining  and  committing  the  supposed  delinquents,  beginning 
to  suspect  that  the  charges  originated  in  some  fatal  mistake, 
showed  an  inclination  to  discourage  them,  and  straightway 
found  that  he  had  drawn  the  dangerous  imputation  on  himself. 
A  constable,  who  had  apprehended  many  of  the  accused,  was 
smitten  with  a  similar  suspicion,  and  hastily  declared  that  he 
would  meddle  in  this  matter  no  farther.  Reflecting  with  alarm 
on  the  danger  he  had  provoked,  he  attempted  to  fly  the  country, 
but  was  overtaken  in  his  flight  by  the  vengeance  of  the  accus 
ers  ;  and,  having  been  brought  back  to  Salem,  was  tried  for 
witchcraft,  convicted,  and  executed.  Some  persons,  whom 
the  instinct  of  self-preservation  had  induced  to  accuse  their 
friends  or  kinsfolk,  touched  with  remorse,  confessed  the  crime 
they  had  been  guilty  of,  and  retracted  their  testimony.  They 
were  convicted  of  relapse  into  witchcraft,  and  died  the  victims 
of  their  returning  virtue. 

At  last,  the  very  excess  of  the  evil  brought  about  its  cure. 
About  fifteen  months  had  elapsed  since  it  first  broke  forth  ;  and 
so  far  from  being  extinguished  or  abated,  it  was  growing  every 
day  more  formidable.  Of  twenty-eight  persons  capitally  con 
victed,  nineteen  had  been  hanged ;  and  one,  for  refusing  to  plead, 
was  pressed  to  death  ;  —  the  only  instance  in  which  this  engine 
of  legal  barbarity  was  ever  employed  in  North  America.  The 
number  of  the  accusers  and  pardoned  witnesses  multiplied  with 
alarming  rapidity.  The  sons  of  Governor  Bradsteet,  and  other 
individuals  of  eminent  station  and  character,  had  fled  from  a 
charge  belied  by  the  whole  tenor  of  their  lives.  A  hundred  and 
fifty  persons  were  in  prison  on  the  same  charge,  and  impeach 
ments  of  no  less  than  two  hundred  others  had  been  presented 
to  the  magistrates.  Men  began  to  ask  where  this  would  end. 
The  constancy  and  piety  with  which  the  unfortunate  victims 
encountered  their  fate  produced  an  impression  on  the  minds  of 
the  people,  which,  though  counterbalanced  at  the  time  by  the 
testimony  of  the  pardoned  witnesses,  gained  strength  from  the 
reflection  that  these  witnesses  purchased  their  lives  by  their 

VOL.  i.  52 


410  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

testimony,  while  the  persons  against  whom  they  had  borne 
evidence  sealed  their  own  testimony  with  their  blood. 

It  was  happy,  perhaps,  for  the  country,  that,  while  the  minds 
of  the  people  were  awakening  to  reflections  thus  reasonable  and 
humane,  some  of  the  accusers  carried  the  audacity  of  their 
arraignment  to  such  a  pitch,  as  to  prefer  charges  of  witchcraft 
against  Lady  Phips,  the  governor's  wife,  and  against  certain 
of  the  nearest  relatives  of  Dr.  Increase  Mather,  the  most 
pious  minister  and  popular  citizen  of  Massachusetts.  This 
circumstance  at  once  opened  the  eyes  of  Sir  William  Phips 
and  Dr.  Mather ;  so  far,  at  least,  as  to  induce  a  strong  suspi 
cion  that  many  of  the  late  proceedings  which  they  had  counte 
nanced  were  rash  and  indefensible.  They  felt  that  they  had 
dealt  with  others  in  a  manner  very  different  from  that  in  which 
they  were  now  reduced  to  desire  that  others  should  deal  with 
them.  A  kindred  sentiment  beginning  also  to  prevail  in  the 
public  mind  encouraged  the  resolute  exertion  by  which  a  cit 
izen  of  Boston  succeeded  in  stemming  the  fury  of  these  ter 
rible  proscriptions.  Having  been  charged  with  witchcraft  by 
some  persons  at  Andover,  he  anticipated  an  arrest,  by  prompt 
ly  arresting  his  accusers  for  defamation,  and  preferring  on  oath 
against  them  a  claim  of  damages  to  the  amount  of  a  thousand 
pounds.  The  effect  of  this  vigorous  conduct  surpassed  his 
most  sanguine  expectations.  It  seemed  as  if  a  spell  that  had 
been  cast  over  the  people  of  Andover  was  dissolved  by  one 
bold  touch  ;  the  frenzy  subsided  in  a  moment,  and  witchcraft 
was  heard  of  in  that  town  no  more.  The  impression  was 
quickly  diffused  throughout  the  province  ;  and  the  influence 
of  it  appeared  at  the  very  next  assize  that  was  held  for  the 
trial  of  witchcraft,  when,  of  fifty  prisoners  who  were  tried  on 
such  evidence  as  was  formerly  deemed  sufficient,  the  accusers 
could  obtain  the  conviction  of  no  more  than  three,  who  were 
instantly  reprieved  by  the  governor.  These  acquittals  were 
doubtless  in  part  produced  by  a  change  which  the  public  opin 
ion  underwent  as  to  the  sufficiency  of  what  was  denominated 
spectral  evidence  of  witchcraft. 

An  assembly  of  the  most  eminent  divines  of  the  province, 
convoked  for  the  purpose  by  the  governor  [June  15th,  1693], 
after  solemn  consideration,  pronounced  and  promulgated  as 


CHAP.  V.]  THE  WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  411 

their  deliberate  judgment,  "  That  the  apparitions  of  persons 
afflicting  others  was  no  proof  of  their  being  witches,"  and 
that  it  was  by  no  means  inconsistent  with  Scripture  or  reason 
that  the  devil  should  assume  the  shape  of  a  good  man,  or  even 
cause  the  real  aspect  of  that  man  to  produce  impressions  of 
pain  on  the  bodies  of  persons  bewitched.  The  ministers, 
nevertheless,  united  in  strongly  recommending  to  the  govern 
ment  the  rigorous  prosecution  of  all  persons  still  accused  of 
witchcraft.  But  the  judgment  they  pronounced  respecting  the 
validity  of  the  customary  evidence  rendered  it  almost  impos 
sible  to  procure  a  judicial  conviction  ;  and  produced,  at  the 
same  time,  so  complete  a  revolution  in  the  public  mind  re 
specting  the  late  executions,  that  charges  of  witchcraft  were 
found  to  excite  no  other  sentiments  than  deep  disgust,  and 
angry  suspicion  of  the  parties  who  preferred  them.  The  dark 
cloud  that  had  overcast  the  peace  and  happiness  of  the  colony 
vanished  entirely  away,  —  and  universal  shame  and  remorse 
succeeded  to  the  frenzy  that  previously  prevailed.  Even  those 
who  continued  to  believe  in  the  reality  of  the  diabolical  influ 
ence  of  which  the  accusers  had  complained,  were  satisfied  that 
most,  if  not  all,  of  the  unfortunate  convicts  were  unjustly  con 
demned,  and  that  their  accusers,  in  charging  them,  were  de 
luded  by  the  same  infernal  agency  by  which  their  sufferings 
were  occasioned.  Many  of  the  witnesses  now  came  forward 
and  published  the  most  solemn  recantations  of  the  testimony 
they  formerly  gave,  both  against  themselves  and  others  ;  apolo 
gizing  for  their  perjury,  by  a  protestation,  of  which  all  were 
constrained  to  admit  the  force,  that  no  other  means  of  saving 
their  lives  had  been  left  to  them.  These  testimonies  were  not 
able  to  shake  the  opinion  which  was  still  retained  by  a  con 
siderable  party  both  among  the  late  accusers  and  the  public  at 
large,  that  the  recent  malady  was  caused  in  part  by  real  witch 
craft,  whether  the  real  culprits  had  yet  been  detected  or  not. 
This  opinion  was  supported  in  learned l  treatises  by  Dr.  Mather 
and  other  eminent  divines.  But  it  was  found  impossible  ever 
after  to  reiterate  prosecutions  that  excited  such  painful  re 
membrances,  and  had  been  rendered  instrumental  to  so  much 

1  "  Here  learning,  blinded  first,  and  then  beguiled, 
Looks  dark  as  ignorance,  as  frenzy  wild.'  —  Savage. 


412  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

barbarity  and  injustice.  Sir  William  Phips,  soon  after  he 
reprieved  the  three  persons  last  convicted,  gave  order  that  all 
who  were  in  custody  on  charges  of  witchcraft  should  be  re 
leased  ;  and,  with  prevenient  dread  of  the  dissensions  that 
might  arise  from  retributory  proceedings  against  the  accusers 
and  their  witnesses,  he  proclaimed  a  general  pardon  to  all 
persons  for  any  participation  imputable  to  them  in  the  recent 
prosecutions.  The  surviving  sufferers  from  those  persecutions, 
however,  and  the  relatives  of  those  who  had  perished,  were 
enabled  to  enjoy  whatever  consolation  they  could  derive  from 
the  sympathy  of  their  countrymen  and  the  earnest  regret  of 
their  persecutors. 

The  House  of  Assembly  appointed  a  general  fast  and  sol 
emn  supplication,  "that  God  would  pardon  all  the  errors  of 
his  servants  and  people  in  a  late  tragedy  raised  among  us  by 
Satan  and  his  instruments."  Sewell,  one  of  the  judges  who 
had  presided  on  the  trials  at  Salem,  stood  up  in  his  place  in 
church  on  this  occasion,1  and  implored  the  prayers  of  the 
people  that  the  errors  which  he  had  committed  might  not  be 
visited  by  the  judgments  of  an  avenging  God  on  his  country, 
his  family,  or  himself.  Many  of  the  jurymen  subscribed  and 
published  a  declaration  lamenting  and  condemning  the  delusion 
to  which  they  had  yielded,  and  acknowledging  that  they  had 
brought  the  reproach  of  wrongful  bloodshed  on  their  native 
land.  Paris,  the  clergyman  who  instituted  the  first  prosecu 
tions  and  promoted  all  the  rest,  found  himself  exposed  to  a 
resentment  not  loud  or  violent,  but  fixed  and  deep  ;  and  was 
at  length  generally  shunned  by  his  fellow-citizens,  and  entirely 
forsaken  by  his  congregation.  He  appears,  throughout  the 
whole  proceedings,  to  have  acted  with  perfect  sincerity,  but 
to  have  been  transported  by  a  violent  temper,  and  a  strong 
conviction  of  the  rightfulness  of  the  ends  he  pursued,  into  the 
adoption  of  means  for  their  attainment,  inconsistent  with  honor, 
justice,  or  humanity.  While  the  delusion  lasted,  his  violence 

1  When  Stoughton,  the  deputy-governor  and  chief  justice,  was  informed  of 
this,  he  "  observed  for  himself,  that  when  he  sat  in  judgment  he  had  the  fear 
of  God  before  his  eyes,  and  gave  his  opinion  according  to  the  best  of  his  un 
derstanding  ;  and  although  it  might  appear  afterwards  that  he  had  been  in 
error,  yet  he  saw  no  necessity  of  a  public  acknowledgment  of  it."  —  Hutch- 
inson. 


CHAP.  V.]  THE  WITCHCRAFT  DELUSION.  413 

was  applauded  as  zeal  in  a  righteous  cause,  and  little  heed  was 
given  to  accusations  of  artifice  and  partiality  in  conducting 
what  was  believed  to  be  a  controversy  with  the  devil.  But 
when  it  appeared  that  all  these  efforts  had  in  reality  been 
directed  to  the  shedding  of  innocent  blood,  his  popularity  gave 
place  to  incurable  odium  and  disgust.  [1694.]  Perceiving, 
too  late,  how  dreadfully  he  had  erred,  he  hastened  to  make  a 
public  profession  of  repentance,  and  solemnly  begged  forgive 
ness  of  God  and  man.  But  as  the  people  declared  their  fixed 
resolution  never  more  to  attend  the  ministry  of  an  individual 
who  had  been  the  instrument  of  misery  and  ruin  to  so  many 
of  their  countrymen,  he  was  obliged  to  resign  his  charge  and 
depart  from  Salem.1 

Thus  terminated  a  scene  of  fury  and  delusion  that  justly 
excited  the  astonishment  of  the  civilized  world,  and  exhibited 
a  fearful  picture  of  the  weakness  of  human  nature  in  the  sud 
den  transformation  of  a  people  renowned  over  all  the  earth  for 
piety  and  virtue  into  the  slaves  or  associates,  the  terrified 
dupes  or  helpless  prey,  of  a  band  of  ferocious  lunatics  and 
assassins.  Among  the  various  evil  consequences  that  resulted 
from  the  preceding  events,  not  the  least  important  was  the 
effect  they  produced  on  the  minds  of  the  Indian  tribes,  who 
began  to  conceive  a  very  unfavorable  opinion  of  a  people  that 
could  inflict  such  barbarities  on  their  own  countrymen,  and  of 
a  religion  that  seemed  to  instigate  its  professors  to  their  mutual 
destruction.  This  impression  was  the  more  disadvantageous 
to  the  colonists,  as  there  had  existed  for  some  time  a  competi 
tion  between  their  missionaries  and  the  priests  of  the  French 
settlements,  for  the  conversion  of  the  Indians,2  who  invariably 

1  Mather,  Life  of  Sir  William  PJdps.  Increase  Mather's  Cases  of  Con 
science  concerning  Evil  Spirits.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Calef's  Wonders  of  the 
Invisible  World.  Oldmixon.  "  I  find  these  entries  in  the  MS.  Diary  of  Judge 
Sewell :  'Went  to  Salem,  where,  in  the  meeting-house,  the  persons  accused 
of  witchcraft  were  examined ;  a  very  great  assembly.  'T  was  awful  to  see 
how  the  afflicted  persons  were  agitated.'  But  in  the  margin  is  written,  in  a 
tremulous  hand,  probably  on  a  subsequent  review,  the  lamenting  Latin  inter 
jection,  V(k,  re;,  vat  I"  Holmes.  "It  is  likely,"  says  Wynne,  "that  this 
frenzy  contributed  to  work  off  the  ill-humors  of  the  New  England  people, — 
to  dissipate  their  bigotry,  —  and  to  bring  them  to  a  more  free  use  or  their 
reason." 

*  It  was  a  very  corrupted  edition  of  Christianity  that  the  French  priests  un 
folded  to  the  Indians,  —  a  system  that  harmonized  too  well  with  the  passions 
and  sentiments  which  genuine  Christianity  most  strongly  condemns.  By  rites 


414  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

embraced  the  political  interests  of  that  nation  whose  religious 
instructors  were  most  popular  among  them.  The  French  did 
not  fail  to  improve  to  their  own  advantage  the  odious  spec 
tacle  that  the  late  frenzy  of  the  people  of  New  England  had 
exhibited  ;  and  to  this  end  they  labored  with  such  diligence 
and  success,  that  in  the  following  year,  when  Sir  William 
Phips  paid  a  visit  to  the  tribes  with  whom  he  had  concluded 
the  treaty  of  Pemmaquid,  and  endeavoured  to  unite  them  in  a 
solid  and  lasting  friendship  with  his  own  people,  he  found  them 
more  firmly  wedded  than  ever  to  the  interests  of  the  French, 
and  prepossessed  with  sentiments  unfavorable  in  the  highest 
degree  to  the  formation  of  friendly  relations  with  the  English. 
To  his  proposition  of  renewing  the  treaty  of  peace  they  read 
ily  agreed  ;  but  all  the  urgency  which  he  exerted  to  induce 
them  to  desist  from  their  correspondence  with  the  French 
proved  unavailing.  They  refused  to  listen  to  the  missionaries 
who  accompanied  him  ;  having  learned  from  the  French  priests 
to  believe  that  the  English  were  heretics,  and  enemies  to  the 
true  religion  of  Christ.  Some  of  them,  with  blunt  sincerity, 
acquainted  Phips,  that,  since  they  had  received  the  instructions 
of  the  French,  witchcraft  had  lost  all  perceptible  existence 
among  their  tribes,  and  that  they  desired  not  to  recall  its  pres 
ence  by  familiar  intercourse  with  a  people  among  whom  it  was 
reputed  to  prevail  still  more  extensively  than  it  had  ever  yet 
done  with  themselves.1 

There  were  not  wanting  signs  foreboding  the  renewal  of  war 
between  the  colonists  and  the  Indians,  which  accordingly  broke 
out  very  soon  after,  —  and  was  perhaps  accelerated  by  the  de 
parture  of  Sir  William  Phips  from  New  England.  The  ad 
ministration  of  this  officer,  though  in  the  main  highly  and  justly 
popular,  had  not  escaped  some  share  of  reproach.  The  dis 
contents  excited  by  the  taxation  imposed  for  the  support  of 

and  devices,  material  and  yet  mysterious,  it  brought  some  portion  of  the  spirit 
ual  doctrine  of  Christianity  within  the  ranee  of  the  coarse  capacity  of  the 
Indians,  and  facilitated  the  transition  from  their  ancient  and  peculiar  mode  of 
superstition  and  idolatry ;  while,  by  stigmatizing  their  enemies  as  heretics,  it 
afforded  additional  sanction  and  incitement  to  hatred,  fury,  and  cruelty.  The 
French  priests  who  ministered  amongst  the  Indians  were  Jesuits ;  and  their 
maxim,  that  it  was  unnecessary  to  keep  faith  with  heretics,  proved  but  too 
congenial  to  the  savage  ethics  of  their  pupils. 
1  Neal. 


CHAP.  V.]        DEATH  OF  PHIPS.  — HIS  CHARACTER.  415 

the  fortification  at  Pemmaquid,  combining  with  the  resentments 
and  enmities  which  the  prosecutions  for  witchcraft  gave  rise 
to,  produced  a  party  in  the  province  who  labored  on  every 
occasion  to  thwart  the  measures  and  vilify  the  character  of  the 
governor.  Finding  their  exertions  in  Massachusetts  insufficient 
to  deprive  him  of  the  esteem  which  a  great  majority  of  the 
people  entertained  for  him,  his  political  enemies  transmitted 
articles  of  impeachment  against  him  to  England,  and  petitioned 
the  king  and  council  for  his  recall  and  punishment.  King 
William  having  declared  that  he  would  hear  and  judge  the 
controversy  himself,  an  order  was  communicated  to  the  gov 
ernor  to  meet  his  accusers  in  the  royal  presence  at  Whitehall ; 
in  compliance  with  which,  Phips  set  sail  for  England  [No 
vember,  1694],  carrying  with  him  an  address  of  the  assembly 
expressive  of  the  strongest  attachment  to  his  person,  and  be 
seeching  that  the  province  might  not  be  deprived  of  the  ser 
vices  of  so  able  and  meritorious  an  officer.  On  his  appearance 
at  court,  his  accusers  vanished,  and  their  charges  were  dis 
missed  ;  and  having  rendered  a  satisfactory  account  of  his 
administration,  he  was  preparing  to  return  to  his  government, 
when  a  malignant  fever  put  an  end  to  his  life.  [February, 
1695.]  As  a  soldier,  Phips,  if  not  preeminently  skilful,  was 
active  and  brave  ;  as  a  civil  ruler,  he  was  upright,  magnani 
mous,  and  disinterested.  It  was  remarked  of  him,  as  of  Aris- 
tides,  that,  with  a  constant  and  generous  underbearing  of  his 
fortune,  he  was  never  visibly  elated  by  any  mark  of  honor  or 
confidence  that  he  received  from  his  countrymen  ;  nor  could 
all  his  success  and  advancement  ever  make  him  ashamed  to 
recall  the  humbleness  of  his  original  condition.  In  the  midst 
of  a  fleet  that  was  conveying  an  armament  which  he  com 
manded  on  a  military  expedition,  he  addressed  himself  to  some 
young  soldiers  and  sailors  who  were  standing  on  the  deck  of 
his  vessel,  and,  pointing  to  a  particular  spot  on  the  shore,  said, 
"  Young  men,  it  was  upon  that  hill  that  I  kept  sheep  a  few 
years  ago  ;  —  you  see  to  what  advancement  Almighty  God  has 
brought  me ;  do  you,  then,  learn  to  fear  God  and  act  uprightly ; 
and  you  also  may  rise  as  I  have  done."  His  natural  temper 
was  somewhat  hasty  and  impetuous  ;  and  the  occasional  ebul 
litions  of  this  infirmity,  which  his  elevated  station  rendered 


416  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

more  conspicuous,  contributed,  with  the  other  causes  which  we 
have  remarked,  to  attaint  the  lustre  of  his  reputation.1 

On  the  departure  of  Sir  William  Phips,  the  supreme  au 
thority  in  Massachusetts  devolved  on  Stoughton,  the  lieutenant- 
governor  [1695],  who  continued  to  exercise  it  during  the 
three  following  years ;  the  king  being  so  much  engrossed  with 
his  wars  and  negotiations  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  that  it 
was  not  till  after  the  peace  of  Ryswick  that  he  found  leisure 
even  to  nominate  a  successor  to  Phips.  During  this  period, 
the  colony  was  much  disturbed  by  internal  dissension,  and 
harassed  by  the  dangers  and  calamities  of  war.  The  passions 
bequeathed  by  the  prosecutions  for  witchcraft  (which  Stough 
ton  had  zealously  promoted)  continued  long  to  divide  and 
agitate  the  people  ;  and  the  political  factions  which  sprung  up 
during  the  administration  of  Phips  prevailed  with  increased 
virulence  after  his  departure.  The  mutual  animosities  of  the 
colonists  attained  such  a  height,  that  they  seemed  to  be  on  the 
point  of  kindling  a  civil  war  ;  and  the  operations  of  the  pro 
vincial  government  were  cramped  and  obstructed  at  the  very 
time  when  the  utmost  exertions  of  vigor  and  unanimity  were 
requisite  to  encounter  the  hostile  enterprises  of  the  French 
and  the  Indians.  [June,  1695.]  Incited  by  their  French 
allies,  the  Indians  recommenced  the  war  with  all  the  sudden 
ness  and  fury  of  their  military  operations.  Wherever  surprise 
or  superior  numbers  enabled  them  to  prevail  over  parties  of 
the  colonists,  or  detached  plantations,  their  victory  was  signal 
ized  by  the  extremities  of  barbarous  cruelty.2  The  colony  of 

1  Mather,  Life  of  Sir  William  Phips.  Neal.  Constantino,  son  of  Sir  Wil 
liam  Phips,  became  Lord  Chancellor  of  Ireland ;  and  his  descendants  have 
since  enjoyed  the  titles  of  Earl  of  Mulgrave  and  Marquis  of  Normanby  in 
Britain. 

*  Numerous  cases  are  related  by  the  provincial  historians  of  the  torture  and 
slavery  inflicted  by  the  Indians  on  their  captives,  and  of  the  desperate  efforts 
of  many  of  the  colonists  to  defend  themselves  and  their  families,  or  to  escape 
from  the  hands  of  their  savage  enemies.  Wherever  the  Indians  could  pene 
trate,  war  was  carried  into  the  bosom  of  every  family.  The  case  of  a  Mrs. 
Dunstan,  of  Haverhill,  in  Massachusetts,  is  remarkable.  She  was  made  pris 
oner  by  a  party  of  twelve  Indians,  and,  with  the  infant  of  which  she  had 
been  delivered  but  a  week  before,  and  the  nurse  who  attended  her,  forced  to 
accompany  them  on  foot  into  the  woods.  Her  infant's  head  was  dashed  to 
pieces  on  a  tree  before  her  eyes ;  and  she  and  the  nurse,  after  fatiguing 
marches  in  the  depth  of  winter,  were  lodged  in  an  Indian  hut,  a  hundred  ana 
fifty  miles  from  their  home.  Here  they  were  informed  that  they  were  to  be 
made  slaves  for  life,  but  were  first  to  be  conducted  to  a  distant  settlement, 
where  they  would  be  stripped,  scourged,  and  forced  to  run  the  gantlet,  naked, 


CHAP.  V.]     WAR  WITH  THE   FRENCH  AND   INDIANS.          417 

Acadia,  or  Nova  Scotia,  once  more  reverted  to  the  dominion  of 
France.  It  had  been  annexed,  as  we  have  seen,  to  the  jurisdic 
tion  of  Massachusetts,  and  governed  hitherto  by  officers  deputed 
from  the  seat  of  the  superior  authority  at  Boston.  But  Port 
Royal  (or  Annapolis,  as  it  was  afterwards  termed)  having  been 
now  recaptured  by  a  French  armament,  the  whole  settlement 
revolted,  and  reannexed  itself  to  the  French  empire, — a  change 
that  was  ratified  by  the  subsequent  treaty  of  Ryswick. 

A  much  more  serious  loss  was  sustained  by  Massachu 
setts  in  the  following  year,  when,  in  consequence  of  a  com 
bined  assault  by  the  French  and  Indians,  the  fort  erected  by 
Sir  William  Phips  at  Pemmaquid  was  compelled  to  surrender 
to  their  arms,  and  was  levelled  with  the  ground.  [1696.] 
Chubb,  the  commander  of  this  fort,  at  first  replied  to  the 
summons  of  the  invaders,  that  he  would  not  surrender  it,  even 
though  the  sea  were  covered  with  French  vessels,  and  the  land 
with  Indian  allies  of  France  ;  and  the  capitulation  to  which 
he  finally  acceded  was  extorted  from  him  by  the  terror  of  his 
garrison,  to  whom  the  French  commander  announced,  that,  in 
case  of  a  successful  assault,  they  would  be  abandoned  to  the 
rage  of  his  Indian  auxiliaries.  This  severe  and  unexpected 
blow  spread  equal  surprise  and  consternation  ;  and  the  alarm 
ing  consciousness  of  the  danger,  imparted  by  the  loss  of  a  bar 
rier  of  such  consequence,  rebuked  in  the  strongest  manner  the 
factious  discontent  that  had  murmured  at  the  expense  of  main 
taining  it.  These  apprehensions  were  but  too  well  justified 
by  the  increased  ravages  of  Indian  warfare,  and  the  increased 
insolence  and  fury  with  which  a  triumph  so  signal  inspired  the 
Indian  tribes.  Stoughton  and  his  council  exerted  the  utmost 
promptitude  and  vigor  to  repair  or  retaliate  the  disaster,  and 

between  two  files  of  the  whole  tribe  to  which  their  captors  belonged.  This 
intelligence  determined  Mrs.  Dunstan  to  make  an  attempt  that  would  issue 
either  in  her  liberation  or  her  death.  Early  in  the  morning,  having  awaked 
her  nurse,  and  a  young  man  who  was  their  fellow-prisoner,  she  got  possession 
of  an  axe,  and,  with  the  assistance  of  her  two  companions,  despatched  no 
fewer  than  ten  Indians  in  their  sleep.  The  other  two  awoke  and  escaped. 
Mrs.  Dunstan  returned  in  safety  with  her  companions  to  Haverhill,  and  was 
rewarded  for  her  intrepidity  by  the  legislature  of  Massachusetts.  —  Dwight's 
Travels. 

Whatever  other  cruelties  the  Indians  might  exercise  on  the  bodies  of  their 
captives,  it  is  observable  that  they  never  attempted  to  violate  the  chastity  of 
women.  They  showed  a  strong  aversion  to  negroes,  and  generally  killed 
them  whenever  they  fell  into  their  hands.  — Belknap. 

VOL.    I.  53 


418  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

despatched  forces  to  attack  the  enemy  both  by  land  and  sea  ; 
but  miscarriage  attended  both  these  expeditions  ;  and,  at  the 
close  of  the  year,  the  provincial  troops  had  been  unable,  by 
the  slightest  advantage,  to  check  the  assaults  of  the  enemy, 
or  to  cheer  the  drooping  spirits  of  their  countrymen. 

In  the  following  year  [16971],  the  province,  after  being  se 
verely  harassed  by  the  inroads  of  the  Indians,  was  alarmed  by 
the  intelligence  of  a  formidable  invasion  which  the  French  were 
preparing,  with  a  view  to  its  entire  subjugation.  The  com 
mander  of  a  French  squadron  which  was  cruising  on  the  north 
ern  coasts  of  America  had  concerted  with  Count  Frontignac, 
the  governor  of  Canada,  a  joint  attack  by  sea  and  land,  with 
the  whole  united  force  of  the  French  and  Indians,  on  the  col 
ony  of  Massachusetts  ;  and  little  doubt  was  entertained  of  the 
conquest  of  this  people,  and  the  complete  destruction  of  their 
settlements.  On  the  first  intelligence  of  this  design,  all  the 
dauntless  and  determined  spirit  of  New  England  seemed  again 
to  awake  ;  and,  factious  animosities  being  swallowed  up  by 
more  generous  passion,  the  people  vied  with  each  other  in 
zealous  cooperation  with  the  energetic  measures  by  which 
Stoughton  prepared  to  repel  the  threatened  assault.  He 
caused  the  forts  around  Boston  to  be  repaired,  the  whole 
militia  of  the  province  to  be  embodied  and  trained  with  the 
strictest  discipline,  and  every  other  precaution  conducive  to  an 
effectual  defence  to  be  promptly  employed.  In  order  to  as 
certain,  and,  if  possible,  anticipate,  the  operations  of  the  ene 
my  by  land,  he  despatched  a  considerable  force  to  scour  the 
eastern  frontiers  of  the  province  ;  and  these  troops,  encounter 
ing  a  detachment  of  the  Indians,  proceeding  to  join  the  French 
invaders,  overthrew  and  dispersed  it,  after  a  short  engagement. 
This  check,  though  in  itself  of  little  importance,  so  deranged 
the  plans  of  the  governor  of  Canada  as  to  induce  him  to  defer 
the  invasion  of  Massachusetts  by  land  till  the  following  year  ; 
and  the  French  admiral,  finding  his  fleet  weakened  by  a  storm, 

1  In  the  midst  of  these  troubles,  died,  this  year,  full  of  days  and  honor,  the 
venerable  Simon  Bradstreet,  the  last  survivor  of  the  original  planters,  —  for 
many  years  governor  of  Massachusetts, —  and  termed  by  his  countrymen  the 
Nestor  of  New  England.  He  died  in  his  ninety-fifth  year,  earnestly  desiring 
to  be  at  rest,  —  insomuch  (says  Cotton  Mather)  that  it  seemed  as  if  death  were 
conferred  upon  him,  instead  of  life  being  taken  from  him. 


CHAP.  V.]         TREATY  OF  PEACE.  419 

and  apprized  of  the  vigorous  preparations  for  his  reception, 
judged  it  prudent,  in  like  manner,  to  abandon  the  projected  na 
val  attack.  During  the  whole  of  this  protracted  contest,  Con 
necticut  and  Rhode  Island,  though  exempted  from  territorial 
ravage,  shared  in  the  burdens  of  war.  Connecticut,  in  particular, 
was  distinguished  by  the  promptitude  and  liberality  of  the  suc 
cours  which  she  extended  to  the  warfare  of  her  friends,  both  in 
the  eastern  parts  of  New  England  and  on  the  frontiers  of  New 
York.1 

In  the  commencement  of  the  following  year  [1698],  intelli 
gence  reached  America  of  the  treaty  of  Ryswick,  by  which 
peace  was  reestablished  between  Britain  and  France.  By  this 
treaty  it  was  agreed  that  the  two  contracting  powers  should 
mutually  restore  to  each  other  all  conquests  that  had  been  made 
during  the  war,  and  that  commissioners  should  be  appointed  to 
investigate  and  determine  the  extent  and  limits  of  the  adjacent 
territories  of  both  monarchs  in  America.  The  evil  conse 
quences  of  thus  leaving  the  boundaries  of  growing  settlements 
unascertained  were  sensibly  experienced  at  no  distant  date. 

Count  Frontignac,  on  receiving  notice  of  this  treaty,  ac 
quainted  the  chiefs  of  the  Indian  tribes,  whose  martial  coopera 
tion  he  had  obtained,  that  he  could  no  longer  assist  or  counte 
nance  their  hostilities  against  the  English,  and  advised  them  to 
deliver  up  their  captives,  and  make  peace  on  the  best  terms 
they  could  obtain.  The  government  of  Massachusetts,  to  which 
their  pacific  overtures  were  addressed,  sent  two  commissioners 
to  Penobscot  to  meet  their  principal  sachems,  who  endeavoured 
to  apologize  for  their  unprovoked  hostilities  by  ascribing  them 
to  the  artifice  and  instigation  of  the  French  Jesuits.  They 
expressed,  at  the  same  time,  the  highest  esteem,  and  even  a 
filial  regard,  for  Count  Frontignac,  and  an  earnest  desire,  that, 
in  case  of  any  future  war  between  the  French  and  English,  the 
Indians  might  be  permitted  to  observe  a  neutrality  between  the 
belligerent  parties.  After  some  conferences,  a  new  treaty  was 
concluded  with  them,  in  which  they  consented  to  acknowledge 
a  more  unqualified  dependence  on  the  crown  of  England  than 
they  had  ever  before  admitted. 

1  Mather.  Neal.  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  North  America. 
Trumbull.  Holmes. 


420  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

On  the  settlement  of  his  affairs  in  Europe,  the  British  king 
found  leisure  to  direct  some  portion  of  his  attention  to  America, 
and  nominate  a  successor  to  the  office  that  had  been  vacant 
since  the  death  of  Sir  William  Phips.  The  Earl  of  Bellamont 
was  appointed  governor  of  New  York,  Massachusetts,  and  New 
Hampshire.  [May,  1698.]  The  office  of  deputy-governor  of 
the  two  latter  States  was  bestowed  by  this  nobleman  on  Stough- 
ton,  whose  recent  services  and  disinterested  patriotism  effaced 
the  jealousy  with  which  at  one  time  he  was  regarded  by  his 
countrymen,  for  having  accepted  a  seat  in  the  legislative  coun 
cil  of  New  England  during  the  arbitrary  sway  of  Sir  Edmund 
Andros.1 

Having  pursued  the  separate  history  of  the  New  England 
States  up  to  this  period,  we  shall  now  leave  these  interesting 
settlements  in  the  enjoyment  (unhappily,  too  short-lived)  of  a 
peace,  whereof  a  long  train  of  previous  warfare  and  distresses 
had  taught  the  inhabitants  fully  to  appreciate  the  value.  They 
were  now  more  united  than  ever  among  themselves,  and  enriched 
with  an  ample  stock  of  experience  of  both  good  and  evil.  When 
Lord  Bellamont  visited  Massachusetts  in  the  following  year 
[1699],  the  recent  heats  and  animosities  had  entirely  subsided  ; 
he  found  the  inhabitants  generally  disposed  to  harmony  and 
tranquillity,  and  he  contributed  to  cherish  this  disposition  by 
a  policy  replete  with  wisdom,  integrity,  and  moderation.  The 
virtue  that  so  signally  distinguished  the  original  settlers  of  New 
England  was  now  seen  to  shine  forth  among  their  descendants 
with  a  lustre  less  dazzling,  but  with  an  influence  in  some  re 
spects  more  amiable,  refined,  and  humane,  than  attended  its 
original  display. 

One  of  the  causes,  perhaps,  that  conduced  to  the  restoration 
of  harmony  and  the  revival  of  piety  among  this  people,  was 

1  Mather.  Neal.  Hutchinson.  Belknap.  Stoughton  died  in  the  year  1702. 
As  the  colonial  agent  in  England,  he  had  tendered  advice  that  proved  unac 
ceptable  to  his  countrymen  ;  as  a  member  of  the  grand  council  of  Andros,  he 
had  occupied  a  post  which  they  regarded  with  aversion  ;  and  as  lieutenant- 
governor,  he  had  promoted  the  odious  prosecutions  for  witchcraft.  Yet  his  re 
pute  for  honest  and  disinterested  patriotism  finally  prevailed  over  all  the  ob 
structions  of  these  untoward  circumstances  ;  and  a  bright  reversion  of  honor 
attended  the  close  of  his  life.  "  Instead  of  children,"  says  Hutchinson,  "  he 
saw  before  his  death  a  college  reared  at  his  expense,  which  took  the  name  of 
Stoughton  Hall,  and  will  transmit  a  grateful  remembrance  of  his  name  to  suc 
ceeding  ages." 


CHAP.  V.]     CHARACTER  OF  THE   EARLY  SETTLERS.         421 

the  publication  of  various  histories l  of  the  New  England  settle 
ments,  written  with  a  spirit  and  fidelity  well  calculated  to  com 
mend  to  the  minds  of  the  colonists  the  just  results  of  their  na 
tional  experience.  The  subject  was  deeply  interesting ;  and, 
happily,  the  treatment  of  it  was  undertaken  by  writers  whose 
principal  object  was  to  render  this  interest  subservient  to  the 
promotion  of  piety  and  virtue. 

Though  New  England  might  be  considered  as  yet  in  a  state 
of  political  infancy,  it  had  passed  through  a  great  variety  of 
fortune.  It  was  the  adopted  country  of  many  of  the  most  ex 
cellent  men  of  the  age  in  which  its  colonization  began,  and  the 
native  land  of  others  who  inherited  the  character  of  their  an 
cestors,  and  transmitted  it  in  unimpaired  vigor  and  with  added 
renown.  The  history  of  man  never  exhibited  an  effort  of  more 
resolute  and  enterprising  virtue  than  the  original  migration  of  the 
Puritans  to  this  distant  and  desolate  region  ;  nor  have  the  annals 
of  colonization  ever  supplied  another  instance  of  the  foundation 
of  a  commonwealth,  and  its  advancement  through  a  period  of 
weakness  and  danger  to  strength  and  security,  in  which  the 
principal  actors  have  left  behind  them  a  reputation  more  illus 
trious  and  unsullied,  together  with  fewer  memorials  calculated 
to  pervert  the  moral  sense  or  awaken  the  regret  of  mankind. 
The  relation  of  their  achievements  had  a  powerful  tendency  to 
animate  hope  and  perseverance  in  brave  and  virtuous  enter 
prise.  They  could  not,  indeed,  boast,  as  the  founders  of  the 
settlement  of  Pennsylvania  have  done,  that,  openly  professing 
non-resistance  of  injuries,  and  faithfully  adhering  to  that  pro- 

1  Of  these  productions  two  of  the  earliest  in  point  of  composition  were  Gov 
ernor  Bradford's  History  of  the  Colony  of  Plymouth,  and  Governor  Winthrop's 
Journal  of  Events  in  New  England.  But  neither  of  these  was  published  till 
more  than  a  century  after.  The  conclusion  of  Winthrop's  Journal  was  not 
published  till  the  year  1826. 

A  voluminous  history  of  New  England  was  composed  by  William  Hubbard, 
a  Puritan  clergyman  ;  but  never  having  been  published,  it  is  known  only  to 
scholars.  It  is  frequently  referred  to  as  an  authority  by  other  New  England 
historians.  The  author  was  rewarded  for  his  labors  by  the  following  order  of 
the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts,  in  the  year  1682  :  — "  Whereas  it  has 
been  thought  necessary,  and  a  duty  incumbent  upon  us,  to  take  due  notice  of 
all  occurrences  and  passages  of  God's  providence  towards  the  people  of  this 
jurisdiction  which  may  remain  to  posterity,  and  that  the  Rev.  Mr.  William 
Hubbard  hath  taken  pains  to  compile  a  history  of  this  nature,  the  Court  doth 
with  thankfulness  acknowledge  his  labor,  and  hereby  orders  the  treasurer  to 
pay  him  fifty  pounds ;  he  transcribing  the  work  fairly  into  a  book,  that  it  may 
be  the  more  easily  perused."  —  Eliot's  New  England  Biography. 


422  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

fession,  they  had  so  fully  merited  and  obtained  the  divine  pro 
tection  by  an  exclusive  dependence  on  it,  as  to  disarm  the  fe 
rocity  of  barbarians,  and  conduct  the  establishment  of  their 
commonwealth  without  violence  and  bloodshed.  But  if  they 
were  involved  in  numerous  wars,  it  was  the  singular  and  hon 
orable  characteristic  of  them  all,  that  they  were  invariably  the 
offspring  of  self-defence  against  the  unprovoked  malevolence  of 
their  adversaries,  and  that  not  one  of  them  was  undertaken 
from  motives  of  conquest  or  plunder.  Though  they  considered 
these  wars  as  necessary  and  justifiable,  they  sincerely  deplored 
them ;  and,  more  than  once,  the  most  distressing  doubts  were 
expressed,  at  the  close  of  their  hostilities,  if  it  were  lawful  for 
Christians  to  press  even  the  natural  right  of  self-defence  to  such 
fatal  extremity.  They  behaved  to  the  Indian  tribes  with  as  much 
good  faith  and  justice  as  they  could  have  shown  to  a  powerful 
and  civilized  people,1  and  were  incited  by  the  manifest  inferiority 
of  those  savage  neighbours  to  no  other  acts  than  a  series  of 
the  most  magnanimous  and  laudable  endeavours  to  instruct  their 
ignorance  and  improve  their  condition.  If  they  fell  short  of  the 
colonists  of  Pennsylvania  in  the  exhibition  of  Christian  meek 
ness,  they  unquestionably  excelled  them  in  extent  and  activity 
of  Christian  exertion.  The  Quakers  succeeded  in  conciliating 
the  Indians  ;  the  Puritans  endeavoured  to  civilize  them. 

The  chief,  if  not  the  only  fault,  with  which  impartial  history 

1  Not  only  was  all  the  territory  occupied  by  the  colonists  fairly  purchased 
from  its  Indian  owners,  but,  in  some  parts  of  the  country,  the  lands  were 
subject  to  quitrents  to  the  Indians,  "  which,"  says  Belknap,  in  1784,  "  are  an 
nually  paid  to  their  posterity."  A  great  English  writer  has  represented  an 
Indian  chief  as  moralizing  on  the  policy  and  pretensions  of  the  European 
colonists  in  the  following  strains :  — "  Others  pretend  to  have  purchased  a 
right  of  residence  and  tyranny ;  but  surely  the  insolence  of  such  bargains  is 
more  offensive  than  the  avowed  and  open  dominion  of  force."  Dr.  Johnson's 
Idler.  The  Indians,  indeed,  were  no  strangers  to  such  sentiments.  Behold 
ing  with  ignorant  wonder  and  helpless  envy  the  augmented  value  which  the 
lands  they  had  sold  derived  from  the  industry  and  skill  of  the  purchasers,  they 
very  readily  admitted  the  belief  that  they  had  been  defrauded  in  the  original 
vendition.  But  abundant  evidence  has  been  preserved  by  the  New  England 
historians,  that  the  prices  paid  by  the  colonists,  so  far  from  being  lower,  were 
in  general  much  higher  than  the  just  value  of  the  land. 

F  am  sorry  to  observe  some  modern  (even  American)  writers  indulge  a  spir 
it  of  perverse  paradox  in  palliating  and  even  defending  the  conduct  of  the 
Indians  at  the  expense  of  the  first  race  of  British  colonists,  who  in  reality 
treated  the  Indians  with  an  equity  which  succeeding  generations  would  do 
better  literally  to  imitate  than  captiously  to  depreciate.  The  new  historian  of 
already  recorded  times  ought  diligently  to  guard  at  once  against  the  force  of 
prejudice  and  the  effects  of  novelty. 


CHAP.  V.]     CHARACTER  OF  THE   EARLY  SETTLERS.          423 

must  ever  reproach  the  conduct  of  these  people,  is  the  religious 
intolerance  that  they  cherished,  and  the  persecution,  which,  on 
too  many  occasions,  it  prompted  them  to  inflict.  Happily  for 
their  own  character,  the  provocation  which  in  some  instances 
they  received  from  the  objects  of  their  severity  tended  greatly 
to  extenuate  the  blame  ;  and  happily,  no  less,  for  the  legitimate 
influence  of  their  character  on  the  minds  of  their  posterity,  the 
fault  itself,  notwithstanding  every  extenuation,  stood  so  manifestly 
opposed  to  the  very  principles  with  which  their  own  fame  was 
for  ever  associated,  that  it  was  impossible  for  a  writer  of  com 
mon  integrity,  not  involved  in  the  immediate  heat  of  controversy, 
to  render  a  just  tribute  to  their  excellence,  without  finding  him 
self  obliged  to  remark  and  condemn  this  signal  departure  from 
it.  The  histories  that  were  now  published  were  the  com 
positions  of  the  friends,  associates,  and  successors  of  the  original 
colonists.  Written  with  an  energy  of  just  encomium  that  el 
evated  every  man's  ideas  of  his  ancestors  and  his  country,  and 
of  the  duties  which  arose  from  these  natural  or  patriotic  re 
lations,  these  works  excited  universally  a  generous  sympathy 
with  the  characters  and  sentiments  of  the  fathers  of  New  Eng 
land.  The  writers,  nevertheless,  were  too  conscientious  and 
too  enlightened  to  confound  the  virtues  with  the  defects  of  the 
character  they  described  ;  and  while  they  dwelt  apologetically 
on  the  causes  by  which  persecution  had  been  provoked,  they 
lamented  the  infirmity  that  (under  any  degree  of  provocation) 
had  betrayed  good  men  into  conduct  so  oppressive  and  un 
christian.  Even  Cotton  Mather,  the  most  encomiastic  of  the 
historians  of  New  England,  and  who  cherished  very  strong 
prejudices  against  the  Quakers  and  other  persecuted  sectaries, 
has  expressed  still  stronger  disapprobation  of  the  severities  they 
encountered  from  the  objects  of  his  encomium.  These  rep 
resentations  could  not  fail  to  produce  a  beneficial  effect  on  the 
people  of  New  England.  They  saw  that  the  glory  of  their  na 
tive  land  was  associated  with  principles  that  could  never  coa 
lesce  with  or  sanction  intolerance  ;  and  that  every  instance  of 
persecution  with  which  their  annals  were  stained  was  a  der 
eliction  of  those  principles,  and  an  impeachment  of  their  coun 
try's  claim  to  the  admiration  of  mankind.  Inspired  with  the 
warmest  attachment  to  the  memory,  and  the  highest  respect  for 


424  HISTORY  OF   NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

the  virtue,  of  their  ancestors,  they  were  forcibly  admonished, 
by  the  errors  into  which  they  had  fallen,  to  suspect  and  repress 
in  themselves  those  erring  sentiments  from  which  even  virtue 
of  so  high  an  order  had  not  afforded  exemption.  From  this 
time  the  religious  zeal  of  the  people  of  New  England  was  no 
longer  perverted  by  intolerance  or  disgraced  by  persecution  ; 
and  the  influence  of  Christianity,  in  mitigating  enmity  and  pro 
moting  kindness  and  indulgence,  derived  a  freer  scope  from  the 
growing  conviction  that  the  principles  of  the  gospel  were  utter 
ly  irreconcilable  with  violence  and  severity ;  and  that,  revealing 
to  every  man  his  own  infirmity  much  more  clearly  than  that  of 
any  other  human  being,  they  were  equally  adverse  to  confi 
dence  in  himself  and  to  condemnation  of  others.  Cotton  Mather, 
who  recorded  and  reproved  the  errors  of  the  first  colonists, 
lived  to  witness  the  success  of  his  monitory  representations  in 
the  charity  and  liberality  of  their  descendants.1 

New  England,  having  been  colonized  by  men  not  less  emi 
nent  for  learning  than  piety,  was  distinguished  at  an  early  pe 
riod  by  the  labors  of  her  scholars  and  the  dedication  of  her 
literature  to  the  nurture  of  religious  sentiment  and  principle. 
The  theological  works  of  John  Cotton,  Hooker,  the  two  Math 
ers,  and  other  New  England  divines,  have  always  enjoyed  a 
high  degree  of  esteem  and  popularity,  not  only  in  New  Eng 
land,  but  in  every  Protestant  country  of  Europe.  The  annals 
of  the  various  States,  and  the  biography  of  their  founders,  were 
written  by  contemporary  historians  with  a  minuteness  which  was 

1  A  discourse,  which  he  published  some  years  after  this  period,  contains  the 
following  passage  :  —  "  In  this  capital  city  of  Boston  there  are  ten  assemblies 
of  Christians  of  different  persuasions,  who  live  so  lovingly  and  peaceably  to 
gether,  doing  all  the  offices  of  neighbourhood  for  one  another  in  such  a  man 
ner,  as  may  give  a  sensible  rebuke  to  all  the  bigots  of  uniformity,  and  show 
them  how  consistent  a  variety  of  rites  in  religion  may  be  with  the  tranquillity 
of  human  society ;  and  may  demonstrate  to  the  world  that  persecution  for 
conscientious  dissents  in  religion  is  an  abomination  of  desolation,  a  thing 
whereof  all  wise  and  just  men  will  say,  '  Cursed  be  its  anger,  for  it  is  fierce, 
and  its  wrath,  for  it  is  cruel.'  "  Neal's  Present  State  of  New  England.  The 
first  Episcopal  society  was  formed  in  Massachusetts  in  1686  (before  the  arrival 
of  Andros) ;  and  the  first  Episcopal  chapel  was  erected  at  Boston  in  1688. 
Collections  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society.  A  Quaker  meeting-house 
was  built  at  Boston  in  1710.  Ibid.  Mass  was  performed  for  the  first  time 
in  Boston,  by  a  Roman  Catholic  priest,  in  1788.  Holmes.  "  It  is  remark 
able,"  says  the  writer,  "  that  the  same  church,  which  was  originally  built  [at 
Boston]  for  French  Protestants  who  had  fled  from  the  persecution  of  the  Ro 
man  Catholics,  was  the  first  to  receive  the  Roman  Catholics  who  fled  from 
the  persecution  of  the  Jacobins  of  France." 


CHAP.  V.]     EARLY  HISTORIES  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  425 

very  agreeable  and  interesting  to  the  first  generation  of  their 
readers,  and  to  which  the  writers  were  prompted,  in  some 
measure  at  least,  by  the  conviction  they  entertained  that  their 
countrymen  had  been  honored  with  the  signal  favor  and  es 
pecial  guidance  and  direction  of  Divine  Providence.  This  con 
viction,  while  it  naturally  betrayed  these  writers  into  the  fault 
of  prolixity,  enforced  by  the  strongest  sanctions  the  accuracy 
and  fidelity  of  their  narrations.  Recording  what  they  consid 
ered  the  peculiar  dealings  of  God  with  a  people  peculiarly  his 
own,  they  presumed  not  to  disguise  the  infirmities  of  their 
countrymen  ;  nor  did  they  desire  to  magnify  the  divine  grace 
in  the  infusion  of  human  virtue  beyond  the  divine  patience  in 
enduring  human  frailty  and  imperfection.  Nay,  the  errors  and 
failings  of  the  illustrious  men  whose  lives  they  related  gave 
additional  weight  to  the  impression  which  above  all  they  de 
sired  to  convey,  that  the  colonization  of  New  England  was  an 
extraordinary  work  of  Heaven  ;  that  the  counsel  and  the  virtue 
by  which  it  was  conducted  and  achieved  were  not  of  human 
origin  ;  and  that  the  glory  of  God  was  displayed  no  less  in 
imparting  the  strength  and  wisdom  than  in  controlling  the 
weakness  and  perversity  of  the  instruments  which  he  conde 
scended  to  employ.1 

The  most  considerable  of  these  historical  works,  and  one 
of  the  most  interesting  performances  that  the  literature  of 
New  England  has  ever  produced,  is  the  Magnolia  Christi 
Jlmericana,  or  History  of  New  England,  by  Cotton  Mather. 
Of  this  work,  the  arrangement  is  exceedingly  faulty ;  and 
its  vast  bulk  must  continue  to  render  its  exterior  increasing 
ly  repulsive  to  modern  readers.  The  continuity  of  the  nar 
rative  is  frequently  broken  by  the  introduction  of  long  dis 
courses,  epistles,  and  theological  reflections  and  dissertations  ; 
biography  is  intermixed  with  history  ;  and  events  of  local 

1  "  If  we  look  on  the  dark  side,  the  human  side,  of  this  work,  there  is 
much  of  human  weakness  and  imperfection  hath  appeared  in  all  that  hath 
been  done  by  man,  as  was  acknowledged  by  our  fathers  before  us.  Neither 
was  New  England  ever  without  some  fatherly  chastisements  from  God  ;  show 
ing  that  he  is  not  fond  of  the  formalities  of  any  people  upon  earth,  but  expects 
the  realities  ofpractical  godliness  according  to  our  profession  and  engagement 
unto  him."  —  Higginson's  Attestation,  prefixed  to  Cotton  Mather's  History. 
"  To  vindicate  the  errors  of  our  ancestors,"  says  Jefferson,  "  is  to  make 
them  our  own." 

VOL.   i.  54 


426  HISTORY   OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

or  temporary  interest  are  related  with  tedious  superfluity  of 
detail.  It  is  not  so  properly  a  single  or  continuous  historical 
narration,  as  a  collection  of  separate  works  illustrative  of  the 
various  scenes  of  New  England  history,  under  the  heads  of 
Remarkable  Providences,  Remarkable  Trials,  and  numberless 
other  subdivisions.  ,A  plentiful  intermixture  of  puns,  anagrams, 
and  other  barbarous  conceits,  exemplifies  a  peculiarity  (the 
offspring  partly  of  bad  taste  and  partly  of  superstition)  which 
was  very  prevalent  among  the  prose-writers,  and  especially  the 
theologians,  of  that  age.  Notwithstanding  these  defects,  the  work 
will  amply  repay  the  labor  of  every  reader.  The  biographical 
portions,  in  particular,  possess  the  highest  excellence,  and  are 
superior  in  dignity  and  interest  to  the  compositions  of  Plutarch. 
Cotton  Mather  was  the  author  of  a  great  many  other  works,1 
some  of  which  have  been  highly  popular  and  eminently  useful. 
One  of  them  bears  the  title  of  Essays  to  do  Good,  and  contains 
a  lively  and  forcible  representation  (conveyed  with  more  brevi 
ty  than  the  author  usually  exemplifies)  of  the  opportunities 
which  every  rank  and  every  relation  of  human  life  may  present 
to  a  devout  mind,  of  promoting  the  glory  of  God  and  the  good 
of  mankind.  Dr.  Franklin,  in  the  latter  years  of  his  active 
and  useful  life,  declared  that  all  the  good  he  had  ever  done  to 
his  country  or  his  fellow-creatures  must  be  ascribed  to  the 
impression  produced  on  his  mind  by  perusing  that  little  work 
in  his  youth.2  It  is  curious  to  find  an  infidel  philosopher  thus 
ascribe  his  own  practical  wisdom  to  the  lessons  of  a  Christian 

1  His  biographers  have  given  us  a  catalogue  of  his  works,  amounting  to  no 
fewer  than  three  hundred  and  eighty-two,  —  many,  no  doubt,  of  small  dimen 
sions,  but  others  of  considerable  bulk.  He  was  a  singular  economist  of  time, 
and  at  once  the  most  voluminous  and  popular  writer  and  the  most  zealous 
and  active  minister  of  his  age.  Among  his  manuscripts  was  a  theological 
work  which  he  had  prepared  for  publication,  and  which  is  reported  to  have 
been  "  enough  constantly  to  employ  a  man,  unless  he  be  a  miracle  of  dili 
gence,  the  half  of  the  threescore  years  and  ten  allowed  us."  Holmes.  In 
conversation  he  is  said  to  have  particularly  excelled :  —  "  Here  it  was  seen 
how  his  wit  and  fancy,  his  invention,  his  quickness  of  thought,  and  ready  ap 
prehension  were  all  consecrated  to  God,  as  well  as  his  will  and  affections." 
Ibid.  Above  his  study  door  was  inscribed  this  impressive  admonition  to  his 
visitors,  "  Be  short."  He  was  the  son  of  Dr.  Increase  Mather.  Born  in  1663, 
he  died  in  1727.  From  President  Q,uincy 's  History  of  Harvard  University,  it  ap 
pears  to  me,  much  more  clearly  than  agreeably,  that,  in  the  instance  of  Cotton 
Mather  as  well  as  of  his  father,  a  strong  and  acute  understanding,  though 
united  with  real  piety,  was  sometimes  corrupted  by  a  deep  vein  of  passionate 
vanity  and  absurdity. 

3  Franklin's  Works. 


CHAP.  V.]    STATE  OF  LITERATURE  AND   EDUCATION.     427 

divine,  and  trace  the  stream  of  his  beneficence  to  the  fountain 
of  the  gospel. 

History  and  divinity  were  the  chief,  but  not  the  only,  subjects 
which  exercised  the  labors  of  the  scholars  of  New  England. 
John  Sherman,  an  eminent  Puritan  divine,  who  was  one  of  the 
first  emigrants  from  Britain  to  Massachusetts,  where  he  died  in 
1685,  obtained  a  high  and  just  renown  as  a  mathematician  and 
astronomer.  He  left  at  his  death  a  large  manuscript  collection 
of  astronomical  calculations  ;  and  for  several  years  published 
an  almanac,  which  was  interspersed  with  pious  reflections  and 
admonitions.1  * 

A  traveller,  who  visited  Boston  in  the  year  1686,  mentions 
several  booksellers  there  who  had  already  made  fortunes  by 
their  trade.  The  learned  and  ingenious  author  of  the  History 
of  Printing  in  America  has  given  a  catalogue  of  the  works 
published  by  the  first  New  England  printers  in  the  seventeenth 
century.  Considering  the  circumstances  and  numbers  of  the 
people,  the  catalogue  is  amazingly  copious.  One  of  the  printers 
of  that  age  was  an  Indian,  the  son  of  one  of  the  first  Indian 
converts.2 

The  education  and  habits  of  the  people  of  New  England 
prepared  them  to  receive  the  full  force  of  those  impressions 
which  their  national  literature  was  fitted  to  produce.  In  no 
country  have  the  benefits  of  knowledge  been  ever  more  highly 
prized  or  more  generally  diffused.  Institutions  for  the  educa 
tion  of  youth  were  coeval  with  the  foundation  of  the  first  pro 
vincial  community,  and  were  propagated  with  every  accession 
to  the  population  and  every  extension  of  the  settlements.  Edu 
cation  was  facilitated  in  New  England  by  the  peculiar  manner 
in  which  its  colonization  was  conducted.  In  many  other  parts 
of  America,  the  planters  dispersed  themselves  over  the  face 
of  the  country  ;  each  residing  on  his  own  farm,  and,  in  choos 
ing  the  spot  where  his  house  was  to  be  placed,  guided  merely 
by  considerations  of  agricultural  convenience.  The  advan 
tages  resulting  from  this  mode  of  inhabitation  were  gained  at 
the  expense  of  such  dispersion  of  dwellings  as  rendered  it  dif 
ficult  to  fix  upon  proper  spots  for  the  erection  of  churches 

1  Eliot's  New  England  Biography. 

8  Dunton's  Life  and  Errors.     Thomas's  History  of  Printing  in  America. 


428  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.          [BOOK  II. 

and  schools,  and  obstructed  the  enjoyment  of  social  inter 
course.  But  the  colonization  of  New  England  was  conducted 
in  a  manner  much  more  favorable  to  the  improvement  of  hu 
man  character  and  manners.  All  the  original  townships  were 
formed  in  what  is  termed  in  America  the  village  manner ; l  the 
inhabitants  having  originally  planted  themselves  in  societies, 
from  regard  to  the  ordinances  of  religion  and  the  convenience 
of  education.  Every  town  containing  fifty  householders  was 
obliged  by  law  to  provide  a  schoolmaster  qualified  to  teach 
reading  and  writing  ;  and  every  town  containing  a  hundred 
householders,  to  maintain  a  grammar  school.2  But  the  gen 
erous  ardor  of  the  people  continually  outstripped  the  pro 
visions  of  this  law.  We  have  seen  Harvard  College  arise  in 
Massachusetts  within  a  few  years  after  the  foundation  of  the 
colony  was  laid.3  With  allusion  to  the  flourishing  and  efficient 
condition  of  this  seminary,  Lord  Bellamont,  the  provincial  gov 
ernor,  in  an  address  to  the  General  Court,  in  1699,  remarked, 
"  It  is  a  very  great  advantage  you  have  above  other  provinces, 
that  your  youth  are  not  put  to  travel  for  learning,  but  have  the 
Muses  at  their  doors."  The  other  States,  for  some  time  after, 
were  destitute  of  the  wealth  and  population  necessary  to  support 
similar  establishments  within  their  own  territories  ;  but  they 
frequently  assessed  themselves  in  the  most  liberal  contributions 
for  the  maintenance  and  enlargement  of  Harvard  College. 
The  contributions,  even  at  a  very  early  period,  of  Connecticut, 
New  Haven,  and  New  Hampshire  have  been  particularly  and 
deservedly  noted  for  their  liberality.4  The  close  of  the  same 
century  was  illustrated  by  the  establishment  of  Yale  College 
in  Connecticut.  So  high  was  the  repute  which  this  quarter  of 
North  America  long  continued  to  enjoy  for  the  moral  excel 
lence  and  intellectual  efficiency  of  its  seminaries  of  education, 
that  many  respectable  persons,  both  in  the  other  American 
States  and  in  Europe,  and  even  some  of  patrician  rank  and 
lineage  in  Britain,  sent  their  children  to  be  educated  in  New 
England.5 

1  Dwight's  Travels.  2  Abridgment  of  the  Laws  of  New  England.    Neal. 

8  See  Note  XIV.,  at  the  end  of  the  volume. 

4  Trumbull.     Belknap. 

6  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  America.  Peirce's  and  Quincy's  His 
tories  of  Harvard  University.  In  aid  of  the  library  of  Yale  College,  copies  of 
their  works  were  contributed  by  the  most  illustrious  writers  in  England ;  and 


CHAP.  V.]  DIFFUSION  OF  KNOWLEDGE.  —  POPULATION.     429 

A  general  appetite  for  knowledge  and  a  universal  familiarity 
with  letters  were  thus  maintained  from  the  beginning  of  their 
national  existence  among  the  New  England  colonists.  The 
rigid  discouragement  of  frivolous  amusements,  and  of  every  rec 
reation  that  bordered  upon  vice,  tended  to  devote  their  leis 
ure  hours  to  reading  ;  and  the  sentiments  and  opinions  derived 
through  this  avenue  of  knowledge  sunk  deeply  into  vigorous 
and  undissipated  minds.  The  historical  retrospections  of  this 
people  were  peculiarly  calculated  to  exercise  a  favorable  in 
fluence  on  their  character  and  turn  of  thinking,  by  awakening  a 
generous  emulation,  and  connecting  them  with  a  uniform  and 
progressive  course  of  manly,  patient,  and  successful  virtue. 

Notwithstanding  the  general  diffusion  of  knowledge  among 
the  early  colonists  of  New  England,  the  lower  classes  of  the 
people  were  not  entirely  exempt  from  the  prevalent  delusions 
of  the  age.  In  particular,  the  notion,  then  generally  received 
in  the  parent  state,  and  consecrated  by  a  special  office  long 
retained  in  her  church  liturgy,  of  the  efficacy  of  the  royal 
touch  for  the  cure  of  the  disorder  called  the  king's  evil,  was 
imported  into  New  England,  to  the  great  inconvenience  of 
those  victims  of  the  malady  who  were  so  unhappy  as  to  enter 
tain  it.  Belknap  has  transcribed  from  the  records  of  the  town 
of  Portsmouth,  in  New  Hampshire,  the  petition  of  an  inhab 
itant  to  the  assembly  of  this  province,  in  the  year  1687,  for 
assistance  to  undertake  a  journey  to  England,  that  he  might  be 
cured  of  his  disease  by  coming  in  contact  with  a  king  ; l  a  cir 
cumstance  which  Heaven  (it  may  be  hoped)  has  decreed  a 
perpetual  impossibility  within  the  confines  of  North  America. 

The  amount  of  the  population  of  New  England  at  the  pres 
ent  era  has  been  very  differently  estimated  by  different  writers. 
According  to  Sir  William  Petty,  the  number  of  inhabitants 
amounted,  in  the  year  1691,  to  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand.2 
A  much  lower  computation  is  adopted  by  Neal ;  and  a  much 
higher  by  a  later  historian.3  The  population,  it  is  certain,  had 
been  considerably  augmented,  both  by  the  emigration  of  Dis- 

among  others  by  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Sir  Richard  Blackmore,  Sir  Richard 
Steele,  Bishop  Burnet,  Dr.  Woodward,  Dr.  Halley,  Dr.  Bentley,  Calamy, 
Henry,  and  Whiston.  —  Holmes. 

1  Belknap.     Smollett' a  History  of  England. 

2  Political  Arithmetic. 

3  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  North  America. 


430  HISTORY  OF   NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

senters  from  various  of  the  European  states,  and  by  domestic 
propagation  in  circumstances  so  favorable  to  increase.  Yet  no 
quarter  of  North  America  has  had  its  own  population  so  ex 
tensively  drained  by  emigration  as  New  England,  which,  from 
a  very  early  period  of  its  history,  has  continually  furnished 
swarms  of  hardy,  sober,  intelligent,  enterprising,  and  educated 
men  to  recruit  and  improve  every  successive  settlement  that 
has  offered  its  resources  to  industry  and  virtue.  The  severe 
restraint  of  licentious  intercourse,  the  facility  of  acquiring 
property  and  maintaining  a  family,  and  the  prevalence  of  in 
dustrious  and  frugal  habits  among  all  classes  of  people  com 
bined  with  happy  efficacy  to  render  marriages  both  frequent 
and  prolific  in  New  England.  Boston,  the  capital  of  Massa 
chusetts,  and  during  many  years  the  largest  town  in  North 
America,  appears  to  have  contained  a  population  of  more  than 
ten  thousand  persons  at  the  close  of  this  century.  In  the  year 
1720,  its  inhabitants  amounted  to  twenty  thousand.  Every  in 
habitant  of  the  province  was  required  by  law  to  keep  a  stock  of 
arms  and  ammunition  in  his  house  ;  and  all  males  above  sixteen 
years  of  age  were  enrolled  in  the  militia,  which  was  assembled 
for  exercise  four  times  a  year.1 

The  whole  territory  of  New  England  was  comprehended  at 
this  period  in  four  jurisdictions,  —  Massachusetts,  New  Hamp 
shire,  Connecticut,  and  Rhode  Island.  To  Massachusetts 
there  were  annexed  the  settlements  of  New  Plymouth  and 
Maine,  and  to  Connecticut  that  of  New  Haven.  The  territo 
ries  of  these  governments  were  divided  into  constituted  districts 
called  townships,  each  of  which  was  represented  by  one  or 
two  deputies  (according  to  the  number  of  freeholders)  in  the 
assembly  of  the  State  to  which  it  belonged.  Besides  this  elec 
tive  franchise,  the  freeholders  of  each  township  enjoyed  the 
right  of  appointing  the  municipal  officers  denominated  select 
men,  by  whom  the  domestic  government  of  the  township  was 
exercised.  The  qualification  of  a  freeholder  in  Massachusetts 
was  declared  by  its  charter  to  be  an  estate  of  the  value  of 
forty  shillings  per  annum,  or  the  possession  of  personal  proper 
ty  to  the  amount  of  fifty  pounds  ;  communion  with  the  Congre 
gational  churches  having  ceased  to  be  requisite  to  the  enjoy- 

1  Neal. 


CHAP.  V.]  POLITICAL  CONDITION.  431 

ment  of  political  privileges.  In  the  other  States  of  New  Eng 
land,  the  qualification  was  nearly  the  same  as  in  Massachusetts. 
The  expenses  of  government  were  defrayed  originally  by  tem 
porary  assessments,  to  which  every  man  was  rated  according 
to  the  value  of  his  whole  property  ;  but  since  the  year  1645, 
excises,  imposts,  and  poll  taxes  were  in  use.  The  judicial 
procedure  in  the  provincial  courts  was  conducted  with  great 
expedition,  cheapness,  and  simplicity.  In  all  trials  by  jury  in 
New  England,  whether  of  civil  or  criminal  causes,  the  juries 
were  not,  as  in  Britain,  nominated  by  the  sheriffs,  but  elected 
by  the  inhabitants  ;  and  these  elections  were  conducted  with 
the  strictest  precautions  for  preventing  the  intrusion  of  partial 
ity  or  corruption.1 

Massachusetts  and  New  Hampshire  —  the  one  enjoying  a 
chartered,  the  other  an  unchartered  municipal  constitution  — 
were  the  only  two  provinces  of  New  England  in  which  the  su 
perior  officers  of  the  domestic  government  were  appointed  by 
the  crown,  and  from  the  tribunals  of  which  an  appeal  was  ad 
mitted  to  the  king  in  council.  As  New  Hampshire  was  too 
inconsiderable  to  support  the  substance  as  well  as  the  title  of  a 
separate  government,  it  was  the  practice  at  this  period,  and 
for  some  time  after,  to  appoint  the  same  person  to  be  gover 
nor  of  Massachusetts  and  New  Hampshire.  In  Connecticut 
and  Rhode  Island,  all  the  officers  of  government  (excepting 
the  members  of  the  Court  of  Admiralty)  were  elected  by  the 
inhabitants  ;  and  so  resolutely  was  this  highly  valued  privilege 
defended,  that,  when  King  William  appointed  Fletcher,  the 
governor  of  New  York,  to  command  the  Connecticut  militia, 
the  province  refused  to  acknowledge  his  authority.2  It  was 
not  provided  by  the  charters  of  these  States  that  their  laws 
should  be  subject  to  the  negative,  or  the  judgments  of  their 
tribunals  to  the  review,  of  the  king.  But  the  validity  of  their 
laws  was  declared  to  depend  on  a  very  uncertain  criterion,  — 
a  conformity,  as  close  as  circumstances  would  admit,  to  the 
jurisprudence  of  England.3  So  perfectly  democratic  were  the 

1  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  North  America.  Wynne's  History  of 
British  America,. 

9  Wynne.     Trumbull.     Book  V.,  Chap.  II.,  post. 

3  There  were  no  prescribed  or  customary  means  of  ascertaining  this  con 
formity  ;  these  States  not  being  obliged,  like  Massachusetts,  to  transmit  their 


432  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

constitutions  of  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island,  that  in  neither 
of  them  was  the  governor  suffered  to  withhold  his  formal  sanc 
tion  from  the  resolutions  of  the  assembly.  The  spirit  of  lib 
erty  was  not  suppressed  in  Massachusetts  by  the  encroach 
ments  of  royal  prerogative  on  the  ancient  privileges  of  the 
people,  but  was  vigorously  exerted  through  the  remaining  and 
important  organ  of  the  provincial  assembly.  All  the  patronage 
that  was  vested  in  the  royal  governor  was  never  able  to  create 
more  than  a  very  inconsiderable  royalist  party  in  this  State. 
The  functionaries  whom  he  or  whom  the  crown  appointed  de 
pended  on  the  popular  assembly  for  the  emoluments  of  their 
offices  ;  and  although  the  most  strenuous  efforts  and  the  most 
formidable  threats  were  employed  by  the  British  ministers  to 
free  the  governor  himself  from  the  same  dependence,  they 
were  never  able  to  prevail  with  the  assembly  to  annex  a  fixed 
salary  to  his  office.  The  people  and  the  popular  authorities 
of  Massachusetts  were  always  ready  to  set  an  example  to  the 
other  colonies  of  a  determined  resistance  to  the  encroachments 
of  royal  prerogative. 

In  all  the  provinces  of  North  America,  and  especially  in 
those  of  New  England,  there  existed  at  this  period,  and  for  a 
long  time  afterwards,  a  mixture  of  very  opposite  sentiments  to 
wards  Great  Britain.  As  the  posterity  of  Englishmen,  the 
colonists  cherished  a  warm  attachment  to  a  land  which  they 
habitually  termed  the  Mother  Country  or  Home,,1  and  to  a 

laws  to  England.  On  a  complaint  from  an  inhabitant  of  Connecticut,  ag 
grieved  by  the  operation  of  a  particular  law,  it  was  declared  by  the  king  in 
council,  "  that  their  law,  concerning  dividing  land-inheritance  of  an  intestate, 
was  contrary  to  the  law  of  England,  and  void  "  ;  but  the  colony  paid  no  re 
gard  to  this  declaration.  —  History  of  the  British  Dominions  in  North  America. 
1  They  have  left  one  indestructible  mark  of  their  origin,  and  their  kindly 
remembrance  of  it,  in  the  British  names  which  they  extended  to  American 
places.  When  New  London,  in  Connecticut,  was  founded  in  the  year  1648, 
the  assembly  of  the  province  assigned  its  name  by  an  act  commencing  with  the 
following  preamble  :  —  "  Whereas  it  hath  been  the  commendable  practice  of 
the  inhabitants  of  all  the  colonies  of  these  parts,  that,  as  this  country  hath  its 
denomination  from  our  dear  native  country  of  England,  and  thence  is  called 
New  England,  so  the  planters,  in  their  first  settling  of  most  new  plantations, 
have  given  names  to  these  plantations  of  some  cities  and  towns  in  England, 
thereby  intending  to  keep  up  and  leave  to  posterity  the  memorial  of  several 
places  of  note  there,"  &c.,  "this  court,  considering  that  there  hath  yet  no 
place  in  any  of  the  colonies  been  named  in  memory  of  the  city  of  London," 
&c.  —  Trumbull. 

"  Certus  enim  promisit  Apollo 
Ambiguam  tenure  nova  Salamina  futuram."  —  Horace. 


CHAP.  V.]  COMMERCE  OF  NEW  ENGLAND.  433 

people  whom,  though  contemporaries  with  themselves,  they  re 
garded  as  holding  an  ancestral  relation  to  them.  As  Ameri 
cans,  their  liberty  and  happiness,  and  even  their  national  ex 
istence,  were  associated  with  the  idea  of  escape  from  royal 
persecution  in  Britain  ;  and  the  jealous  and  unfriendly  senti 
ments  engendered  by  this  consideration  were  preserved,  more 
particularly  in  Massachusetts,  by  the  unjust  abridgment  of  the 
privileges  which  she  had  originally  enjoyed,  and  which  still 
subsisted  unimpaired  in  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island  ;  and 
were  maintained  in  every  one  of  the  provinces  by  the  oppres 
sive  commercial  policy  which  Great  Britain  pursued  towards 
them,  and  of  which  their  increasing  resources  rendered  them 
increasingly  sensible  and  proportionally  impatient.  The  loyal 
ty  of  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island  was  in  no  degree  pro 
moted  by  the  preservation  of  their  ancient  charters,  —  an  ad 
vantage  which  they  well  knew  had  been  yielded  to  them  with 
the  utmost  reluctance  by  the  British  government,  and  of  which 
numerous  attempts  to  divest  them  by  act  of  parliament  were 
made  by  King  William  and  his  immediate  successors.  Even 
the  new  charter  of  Massachusetts  was  not  exempted  from  such 
attacks  ;  and  the  defensive  spirit  that  was  thus  excited  and  kept 
alive  by  the  aggressive  policy  of  Britain  contributed,  no  doubt, 
to  influence,  in  a  material  degree,  the  subsequent  destinies  of 
America. 

In  return  for  the  articles  which  they  required  from  Europe, 
and  of  which  the  English  merchants  monopolized  the  supply,  the 
inhabitants  of  New  England  could  offer  no  staple  commodity 
which  might  not  be  obtained  more  cheaply  in  Europe  by  their 
customers.  They  possessed,  indeed,  good  mines  of  iron  and 
copper,  which  might  have  been  wrought  with  advantage  ;  but 
the  manufacture  of  these  metals  in  the  colonies  was  obstructed 
by  the  dearness  of  labor  ;  and  till  the  year  1750,  the  export  of 
American  iron,  even  to  the  mother  country,  was  restrained  by 
heavy  duties.  The  principal  commodities  exported  from  New 
England  were  the  produce  and  refuse  of  her  forests,  or,  as  it  was 
commonly  termed,  lumber,  and  the  produce  of  her  cod-fishery. 
In  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  annual  imports 
into  these  provinces  from  Britain  were  estimated  by  Neal  at 
£100,000.  The  exports  by  the  English  merchants  consisted  of  a 

VOL.  i.  55 


434  HISTORY   OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK   II. 

hundred  thousand  quintals  (the  quintal  weighing  one  hundred  and 
twelve  pounds)  of  dried  codfish,  which  were  sold  in  Europe  for 
£  80,000,  and  of  three  thousand  tons  of  naval  stores.  To  the 
other  American  plantations,  and  to  the  West  Indies,  New  Eng 
land  sent  lumber,  fish,  and  other  provisions,  valued  at  £50,000 
annually.  An  extensive  manufacture  of  linen  cloth  was  estab 
lished  about  this  time  in  New  England  ;  —  an  advantage  for 
which  this  country  was  indebted  to  the  migration  of  many  thou 
sands  of  Irish  Presbyterians  to  her  shores  about  the  beginning 
•  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Ship-building  was  from  an  early 
period  carried  on  to  a  considerable  extent  at  Boston  and  other 
seaport  towns.  It  was  the  practice  of  some  merchants  to 
freight  their  vessels,  as  soon  as  they  were  built,  with  cargoes 
of  colonial  produce,  and  to  sell  the  vessels  in  the  ports  where 
the  cargoes  were  disposed  of.  The  manufacture  of  tar  was  pro 
moted  for  some  time  in  New  Hampshire  by  an  ordinance  of  the 
assembly  of  this  province  in  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  cen 
tury,  which  allowed  the  inhabitants  to  pay  their  taxes  in  tar  rated 
at  twenty  shillings  per  barrel.  A  great  part  of  the  trade  of  the 
other  American  colonies  was  conducted  by  the  shipping  of  New 
England.  For  many  years  both  before  and  after  the  present 
era,  specie  was  so  scarce  in  this  quarter  of  America,  that  paper 
money  formed  almost  exclusively  the  circulating  medium  in  use 
among  the  inhabitants.  Bills,  or  notes,  were  circulated  for 
sums  as  low  as  half-a-crown.1 

The  progress  of  population  in  the  district  of  Maine  was  re 
markably  slow.  For  many  years  after  its  first  colonization,  the 
greater  number  of  the  emigrants  to  this  region  were  not  hus 
bandmen,  but  traders  and  fishermen,  —  a  description  of  persons 
qualified  neither  by  their  views  nor  their  habits  to  promote  the 
culture  and  population  of  a  desert.  The  soil  of  a  great  part  of 
Maine  was  erroneously  supposed,  by  the  first  European  colonists, 
to  be  ungrateful  to  tillage,  and  incapable  of  yielding  a  sufficient 
supply  of  bread  to  its  inhabitants.  This  notion  produced  the 
deficiency  which  it  presupposed  ;  and,  injurious  as  it  was  to  the 
increase  and  prosperity  of  the  inhabitants,  it  prevailed  even  till 
the  period  of  the  American  Revolution.  Prior  to  this  event, 

1  Neal.     Belknap.     Wynne.     Raynal.     Douglass.     Winterbotham. 


CHAP.  V.]  STATE  OF  RELIGION. 

the  greater  part  of  the  bread  consumed  in  the  district  of  Maine 
was  imported  from  the  middle  colonies.1  New  England  was 
long  infested  with  wolves  ;  and  at  the  close  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  laws  were  still  enacted  by  the  provincial  assemblies, 
offering  bounties  for  the  destruction  of  those  animals.2 

Except  in  Rhode  Island,  the  system  of  religious  doctrine 
and  ecclesiastical  order  embraced  by  the  Congregational  church 
established  by  the  first  colonists  prevailed  generally  in  New 
England.  Every  township  was  required  by  law  to  choose  a 
minister,  and  to  fix  his  salary  by  mutual  agreement  of  the  par 
ties  ;  in  default  of  which,  a  salary  proportioned  to  the  ability 
of  the  township  was  decreed  to  him  by  the  justices  of  the  peace. 
In  case  of  the  neglect  of  any  township  to  appoint  a  minister 
within  a  certain  period  of  time  prescribed  by  law,  the  right  of 
appointment  for  the  occasion  devolved  on  the  Court  of  Quarter 
Sessions.  By  a  special  custom  of  the  town  of  Boston,  the  sal 
aries  of  its  ministers  were  derived  from  the  voluntary  contribu 
tions  of  their  respective  congregations,  collected  every  Sunday 
on  their  assembling  for  divine  service  ;  and  it  was  remarked 
that  none  of  the  ministers  of  New  England  were  so  liberally 
provided  for  as  those  whose  emoluments,  undetermined  by  legal 
provision,  thus  represented  the  diligence  of  their  labors,  and 
the  conscientious  regard  of  their  people.3  In  Rhode  Island 
there  was  no  legal  provision  for  the  celebration  of  divine  wor 
ship,  or  the  maintenance  of  religious  institutions.  This  colony 
was  peopled  by  a  mixed  multitude  of  sectarians,  who,  having 
separated  from  Christian  societies  in  other  places,  had  continued 
ever  since  in  a  broken  and  disunited  state.  In  their  political 
capacity,  the  inhabitants  of  Rhode  Island  admitted  unbounded 
liberty  of  conscience,  and  disavowed  all  connection  between 
church  and  state.  In  their  Christian  relations,  they  made  no 
account  of  the  virtue  of  mutual  forbearance,  and  absolutely  dis 
owned  the  duty  of  submitting  to  one  another  on  any  point, 
whether  essential  or  circumstantial.  Few  of  them  held  regular 
assemblies  for  public  worship  ;  still  fewer  had  stated  places  for 
such  assemblage  ;  and  an  aversion  to  every  thing  that  savored 

1  Sullivan's  History  of  Maine.    Dwight's  Travels. 

2  Trumbull.     Ordinances  of  New  England  to  the  Year  1700.    Chalmers. 

3  Neal. 


436  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

of  restraint  or  formality  prevailed  among  them  all.  Notwith 
standing  the  unlimited  toleration  that  was  professedly  e|tablish- 
ed  in  this  settlement,  its  rulers,  in  1665,  passed  an  ordinance  to 
outlaw  Quakers  and  confiscate  their  estates,  because  they  re 
fused  to  bear  arms.  But  the  people,  in  general,  resisted  this 
regulation,  and  would  not  suffer  it  to  be  executed.1  Cotton 
Mather  declares,  that,  in  1655,  "Rhode  Island  colony  was  a 
colluvies  of  Antinomians,  Famalists,  Anabaptists,  Anti-sabbatari- 
ans,  Arminians,  Socinians,  Quakers,  Ranters,  and  every  thing  but 
Roman  Catholics  and  true  Christians  ;  bona  terra,  mala  gens." 
In  the  town  of  Providence,  which  was  included  in  this  colony, 
and  was  inhabited  by  the  descendants  of  those  schismatics  who 
accompanied  Roger  Williams  and  Mrs.  Hutchinson  in  their  ex 
ile  from  Massachusetts,  the  aversion  to  legal  establishments  and 
every  species  of  subordination  was  carried  to  such  an  extreme, 
that,  at  the  present  period,  the  inhabitants  had  neither  magistrates 
nor  ministers  among  them.  They  entertained  an  invincible  an 
tipathy  to  all  rates  and  taxes,  as  devices  invented  for  the  ben 
efit  of  hirelings,  —  by  which  opprobrious  term  they  designated 
all  civil  and  ecclesiastical  functionaries  who  refused  to  serve 
them  for  nothing.  Yet  they  lived  in  great  amity  with  their 
neighbours,  and,  though  every  man  did  whatever  seemed  right 
in  his  own  eyes,  it  was  seldom  that  any  crime  was  committed 
among  them  ;  "  which  may  be  attributed,"  says  the  historian 
from  whom  this  testimony  is  derived,  "  to  their  great  veneration 
for  the  Holy  Scriptures,  which  they  all  read,  from  the  least  to 
the  greatest."2  Massachusetts  and  Connecticut,  as  they  were 

1  Collections  of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society.     In  the  year  1688,  an 
inhabitant  of  Rhode  Island  was  "  fined  by  the  Quarter  Sessions  for  planting 
a  peach-tree  on  Sunday."   This  occurred  during  the  administration  of  Andros. 
Collections  of  the  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society. 

2  Neal.     We  have  an  account  of  the  religious  condition  of  Rhode  Island, 
about   thirty  years  after  the   period  to  which  we  have  conducted  the  sep 
arate  history  of  New  England,  from  the  pen  of  the  great  and  good  Bishop 
Berkeley,  who  resided  some  years  in  this  colony.     A  general  indifference  to 
religion,  and  a  great  relaxation  of  morality,  had  then  become  the  characteris 
tics  of  the  majority  of  the  people.     Several  churches,  however,  some  on  the 
Congregational,  and  others  on  the  Episcopal  model,  had  been  established;  and 
through  their  instrumentality,  the  blessings  of  religion  were  yet  preserved  in 
the  colony.     Berkeley's  Works. 

"  So  little,"  says  a  writer  much  esteemed  in  America,  "  has  the  civil  author 
ity  to  do  with  religion  in  Rhode  Island,  that  no  contract  between  a  minister 
and  a  society  (unless  incorporated  for  that  purpose)  is  of  any  force.  It  is  prob 
ably  for  these  reasons  that  so  many  sects  -have  ever  been  found  here ;  and  that 
the  Sabbath  and  all  religious  institutions,  as  well  as  good  morals,  have  been 


CHAP.  V.]         STATE  OF  MORALS.  437 

the  most  considerable  of  the  New  England  States  in  respect  of 
wealth  and  population,  so  were  they  the  most  distinguished  for 
piety,  morality,  and  the  cultivation  and  diffusion  of  knowledge. 
At  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century,  there  were  a  hundred 
religious  assemblies  in  Massachusetts,  exclusive  of  numerous 
congregations  of  Christian  Indians.1  The  censorial  discipline 
exercised  by  these  societies  over  their  members  was  highly 
conducive  to  the  preservation  of  sound  morality,  guarded  by  ex 
act  and  sober  manners  ;  and  the  efficacy  of  this  and  of  every 
other  incitement  to  virtue  was  enhanced  by  the  thinly  peopled 
state  of  the  country,  where  no  person  could  screen  his  charac 
ter  or  pursuits  from  the  observation  of  the  public  eye. 

Perhaps  no  country  in  the  world  was  ever  more  distinguished 
than  New  England  was  at  this  time  for  the  general  prevalence 
of  those  sentiments  and  habits  that  render  communities  respect 
able  and  happy.  Sobriety  and  industry  reigned  among  ah1 
classes  of  the  inhabitants.  The  laws  against  immoralities  of 
every  description  were  extremely  strict,  and  not  less  strictly 
enforced  ; a  and,  being  cordially  supported  by  the  executive 

less  regarded  in  this  than  in  any  other  of  the  New  England  States."  Jedediah 
Morse. 

So  late  as  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the  legislature  of  Rhode 
Island  discouraged  the  project  of  a  turnpike  road,  alleging  that  turnpike  du 
ties  and  ecclesiastical  establishments  were  English  practices,  and  badges  of  slav 
ery,  —  from  which  their  people  were  distinguished  above  all  the  other  Amer 
icans  by  a  happy  exemption.  It  was  not  till  the  year  1805  that  the  advantages 
of  turnpike  roads  prevailed  over  the  imaginary  dignity  of  this  exemption. — 
Dwight. 

It  would  be  well  for  the  Americans,  if,  in  the  system  of  management  which 
they  adopt  with  regard  to  roads  and  canals  they  would  ponder  and  avoid  the 
monstrous  vices  inherent  in  the  style  of  those  English  practices  to  which  the 
people  of  Rhode  Island  were  opposed.  No  municipal  government  in  the 
world  has  greater  reason  than  the  American  to  dread  the  evil  effects  of  those 
vices  ;  and  from  its  popular  structure,  none  is  so  well  fitted  to  adopt  the  only 
means  of  effectually  preventing  or  eradicating  them.  This  important  subject 
is  strikingly  elucidated  in  Sir  Henry  Parnell's  Treatise  on  Roads,  but  espe 
cially  in  A  Treatise  on  Internal  Intercourse  and  Communication  in  Civilized 
States,  by  Thomas  Grahame,  brother  of  the  author  of  this  History. 

1  Neat. 

2  Josselyn,  who  visited  New  England,  for  the  first  time,  in  1638,  relates,  that 
in  the  village  of  Boston  there  were  then  two  licensed  inns.     "  An  officer  visits 
them,"  he  adds,  "whenever  a  stranger  goes  into  them;  and  if  he  calls  for  more 
drink  than  the  officer  thinks  in  his  judgment  he  can  soberly  bear  away,  he 
countermands  it,  and  appoints  the  proportion,  beyond  which  he  cannot  get 
one  drop."   Josselyn's  Voyage.  In  1694,  the  selectmen  of  the  several  towns  in 
Massachusetts  were  ordered  to  hang  up  in  every  alehouse  lists  of  all  reputed 
tipplers  and  drunkards  within  their  districts ;  and  alehouse-keepers  were  forbid 
den  to  supply  liquor  to  any  person  whose  name  was  thus  posted.     Holmes. 
The  magistrates  of  some  of  the  towns  of  Scotland  exercised  similar  acts  of  au 
thority.   An  instance  occurred  in  the  town  of  Rutherglen  in  1668.    Ure's  His 
tory  of  Rutherglen. 


438  HISTORY  OF  NORTH   AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

principle  of  public  opinion,  they  rendered  every  vicious  and 
profligate  excess  alike  dangerous  and  discreditable  to  the  per 
petrator.  We  are  assured  by  a  well  informed  writer,  that  at 
this  period  there  was  not  a  single  beggar  in  the  whole  province  ; 
and  a  person  of  unquestioned  veracity,  who  resided  in  it  for 
seven  years,  relates,  that  during  all  that  period  he  never  heard 
a  profane  oath,  nor  witnessed  an  instance  of  inebriety.1  La 
bor  was  so  valuable,  land  so  cheap,  and  the  elective  franchise 
so  widely  extended,  that  every  industrious  man  might  acquire 
a  stake  in  the  soil,  and  a  voice  in  the  civil  administration  of  his 
country.  The  general  diffusion  of  education  caused  the  nation 
al  advantages,  which  were  vigorously  improved,  to  be  justly 
appreciated  ;  and  a  steady  and  ardent  patriotism  knit  the  hearts 
of  the  people  to  each  other  and  to  their  country. 

The  condition  of  society  in  New  England,  the  circumstances 
and  habits  of  the  people,  tended  to  form  among  their  leading 
men  a  character  more  solid  than  brilliant :  —  not  (as  some  have 
imagined)  to  discourage  the  cultivation  or  exercise  of  talent, 
but  to  repress  its  idle  display,  and  train  it  to  its  legitimate  and 
respectable  end,  of  giving  efficacy  to  wisdom,  prudence,  and 
virtue.  Yet  this  state  of  society  was  by  no  means  incompatible 
either  with  politeness  of  manners  or  with  innocent  hilarity. 
Lord  Bellamont  was  agreeably  surprised  with  the  graceful  and 
courteous  behaviour  of  the  gentlemen  and  clergy  of  Connecticut, 
and  confessed  that  he  found  the  manners  and  address  which  he 
had  thought  peculiar  to  feudal  nobility  in  a  land  where  this 
aristocratical  distinction  was  unknown.2  From  Dunton's  ac 
count  of  his  residence  in  Boston  in  1686,  it  appears  that  the 
inhabitants  of  Massachusetts  were  at  that  time  distinguished  in 
a  very  high  degree  by  their  cheerful  vivacity,  their  hospitality, 
and  a^ourtesy  the  more  estimable  that  it  was  indicative  of  gen 
uine  benevolence.3  From  the  circumstances  of  the  country.,  it 
is  impossible  to  suppose  that  the  manners  of  its  inhabitants  could 
exhibit  that  perfection  of  exterior  polish  and  factitious  elegance 
generated  in  old  societies  by  leisure,  wealth,  and  the  necessity 
of  refining  the  means  of  procuring  social  distinction.  But  if  (as 

1  Neal.     Trumbull.  *  Trumbull.     Dwight's  Travels. 

3  Dunton's  Life  and  Errors.  Dunton,  who  was  familiar  with  the  tables  of 
the  rich  in  London,  was  yet  struck  with  the  plenty  and  elegance  of  the  enter 
tainments  he  witnessed  in  Boston. 


CHAP.  V.]  SOCIETY   AND   MANNERS.  439 

has  been  finely  suggested  by  an  ingenious  American,  in  reference 
to  a  later  period  in  his  country),  "  in  the  equal  intercourse  of 
all  classes,  the  higher  had  some  degree  of  polish  rubbed  off,  the 
humbler  were  gainers  by  what  the  others  lost ";  and  while  the  ab 
sence  of  unsuitable  pretensions  and  mean  competitions  banished 
the  most  copious  source  of  vulgarity,  the  diffusion  of  literary 
taste  and  of  liberal  piety  supplied  an  influence  amply  sufficient 
to  soften  and  ennoble  human  manners.  Elegance  may  consist 
with  great  plainness  of  external  circumstances  ;  nay,  in  propor 
tion  as  it  is  unaided  by  exterior  trapping  and  decoration,  its  or 
igin  seems  the  more  pure  and  exalted,  and  its  excellence  the 
more  genuine  and  durable.  It  was  a  remark  of  the  great  Prince 
of  Conde,  that  the  New  Testament  displayed  the  most  perfect 
model  of  a  kind  and  graceful  politeness  that  he  had  ever  met 
with.  Good  manners  consist  in  conducting  ourselves  towards 
every  person  with  a  demeanour  graciously  expressive  of  the 
relation  which  he  holds  to  ourselves  and  others.  Christianity 
at  once  affords  the  justest,  the  most  endearing,  and  most  enlarg 
ed  view  of  the  relations  of  human  beings  to  each  other,  and  en 
forces  by  the  strongest  sanctions  the  duties  and  courtesies  which 
these  relations  infer.  Men  devoted  to  the  service  of  God,  like 
the  first  generations  of  the  inhabitants  of  New  England,  carried 
throughout  their  lives  an  elevated  strain  of  sentiment  and  pur 
pose,  which  must  have  communicated  some  portion  of  its  own 
grace  and  dignity  to  their  manners. 

In  the  historical  and  statistical  accounts  of  the  various  provin 
ces  l  we  continually  meet  with  instances  of  the  beneficial  influ 
ence  exercised  by  superior  minds  on  the  virtue,  industry,  and 
happiness  of  particular  districts  and  infant  settlements.  In  no 
country  has  the  ascendency  of  talent  been  greater,  or  been  more 
advantageously  exerted.  The  dangers  of  Indian  invasion  were 
encountered  and  repelled  ;  the  dejection  and  timidity  produced 
by  them,  surmounted  ;  the  feuds  and  contentions  peculiarly  in 
cident  to  newly  formed  societies  of  men,  collected  from  different 
countries,  and  varying  in  race,  habits,  and  opinions,  were  com 
posed  ;  the  temptations  to  slothful  and  degenerate  modes  of  liv 
ing,  resisted  ;  the  self-denial  requisite  to  the  endowment  of  in- 

1  See,  in  particular,  the  Histories  of  Trumbull  and  Belknap,  and  the  Travels 
of  D wight,  passim. 


440  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

stitutions  for  preaching  the  gospel  and  the  education  of  youth, 
resolutely  practised.  In  founding  and  conducting  to  maturity 
the  new  settlements  that  progressively  arose,  men  of  talent  and 
virtue  enjoyed  a  sphere  of  noble  employment.  They  taught 
both  by  action  and  example.  They  distinguished  themselves 
from  the  rest  of  mankind  by  excelling  them  in  their  common 
pursuits,  and  exercising  a  manifest  superiority  of  understanding 
on  the  ordinary  subjects  of  human  reflection  and  consideration. 
They  exemplified  a  species  of  dignity  at  once  the  most  sub 
stantial  and  the  most  generally  attainable  ;  which  depends  not 
on  opportunities  of  performing  remarkable  deeds,  but  consists 
in  discharging  the  ordinary  duties  of  life  with  a  generous  eleva 
tion  of  sentiment  and  view.  They  read  their  history  in  the  ap 
proving  eyes,  and  improving  manners  and  condition,  of  a  free 
and  happy  people.  Mankind  have  a  greater  aptitude  to  copy 
characters  than  to  yield  obedience  to  precepts  ;  and  virtue  is 
much  more  effectually  recommended  to  their  imitation  and  es 
teem  by  the  exhibition  of  zeal  than  by  the  force  of  argument. 
Let  the  votaries  of  glory  remember,  that,  if  a  life  thus  spent  cir 
cumscribe  the  diffusion  of  the  patriot's  name,  it  extends  the  in 
fluence  of  his  character  and  sentiments  to  distant  generations  ; 
and  that,  if  posthumous  fame  be  any  thing  more  than  a  brilliant 
illusion,  it  is  such  distinction  as  this  from  which  the  surest  and 
most  lasting  satisfaction  will  be  derived. 

The  esteem  of  the  community  was  considered  so  valuable 
a  part  of  the  emoluments  of  public  office,  that  the  salaries  of 
all  municipal  officers,  except  those  who  were  appointed  by  the 
crown,  were,  if  not  scanty,  yet  exceedingly  moderate.  In 
Connecticut,  where  the  public  expenditure,  without  being  sor 
didly  or  unjustly  abridged,  was  contracted  to  the  greatest  ex 
actness  of  thrift,  it  was  remarked,  that  the  whole  annual  ex 
pense  of  its  public  institutions  (about  £  800)  did  not  amount 
to  the  salary  of  a  royal  governor.1  The  slender  emoluments 
of  public  offices,  and  the  tenure  of  popular  pleasure  by  which 
they  were  held,  tended  very  much  to  exempt  them  from  the 
pretensions  of  unworthy  candidates,  and  those  who  were  in 
vested  with  them  from  calumny  and  envy.  Virtue  and  ability 

1  Trumbull. 


CHAP.  V.]          REWARDS  OF  PUBLIC  SERVICE.  441 

were  fairly  appreciated  ;  and  we  frequently  find  the  same  in 
dividuals  reelected  for  a  long  series  of  years  to  the  same 
offices,1  and  in  some  instances  succeeded  by  their  sons,  when 
inheritance  of  merit  recommended  inheritance  of  dignity.  In 
more  than  one  of  the  settlements,  the  first  codes  of  law  were 
the  composition  of  single  persons  ;  the  people  desiring  an  emi 
nent  citizen  to  compose  for  them  a  body  of  laws,  and  then 
legislating  unanimously  in  conformity  with  his  suggestions.  The 
estimation  and  the  disinterestedness  of  public  services  were 
not  unfrequently  attested  by  legislative  appropriations  of  public 
money  to  defray  the  funeral  charges  of  men  who  for  many 
years  had  enjoyed  the  highest  official  dignities.  The  public 
respect  for  distinguished  patriots,  though  not  perpetuated  by 
titles  of  nobility,  was  preserved  in  the  recollection  of  their 
actions,  and  stimulated,  instead  of  relaxing,  the  ardor  of  their 
descendants.  The  virtue  of  remarkable  benefactors  of  their 
country  was  more  diffusively  beneficial  from  their  never  being 
disjoined  from  the  main  trunk  of  the  community  by  titular 
distinctions.  Remaining  incorporated  with  the  general  order 
of  citizens,  their  merit  more  visibly  reflected  honor  upon  it, 
than  if  they  had  been  advanced  to  an  imaginary  eminence, 
tending  to  engender  in  themselves  or  their  descendants  con 
tempt  for  the  mass  of  their  countrymen. 

The  most  lasting,  if  not  the  most  effectually  pernicious,  evil 
with  which  New  England  has  been  afflicted,  was  the  institution 
of  slavery,  which  continued  till  a  late  period  to  pollute  all  its 

1  In  the  year  1634,  the  people  of  Massachusetts  having  elected  a  particular 
individual  to  the  office  of  governor,  in  place  of  Winthrop,  who  had  previously 
enjoyed  this  dignity,  their  conduct  was  censured  by  John  Cotton,  who,  in  a 
sermon  preached  before  the  General  Court,  maintained  that  a  magistrate  ought 
not  to  be  reduced  to  the  condition  of  a  private  individual,  without  some  cause 
of  complaint  publicly  established  against  him.  This  curious  proposition  was 
discussed  by  the  Court,  and  "referred  for  farther  consideration.'  — Winthrop's 
Journal. 

Strikingly  applicable  to  the  early  magistrates  of  New  England  is  the  follow 
ing  description,  by  a  great  German  writer,  of  the  regents  or  judges  of  Israel. 
"  They  were  not  only  simple  in  their  manners,  moderate  in  their  desires,  and 
free  from  avarice  and  ambition,  but  noble  and  magnanimous  men,  who  felt 
that  whatever  they  did  for  their  country  was  above  all  reward,  and  could  not 
be  recompensed ;  who  desired  merely  to  promote  the  public  good,  and  who 
chose  rather  to  deserve  well  of  their  country  than  to  be  enriched  by  its  wealth. 
This  exalted  patriotism  was  partly  of  a  religious  character ;  and  these  regents 
always  conducted  themselves  as  the  officers  of  God."  —  Jahn's  History  of  the 
Hebrew  Commonwealth. 

VOL.  i.  56 


442  HISTORY  OF  NORTH  AMERICA.  [BOOK  II. 

provinces,  and  lingered  the  latest,  though  to  a  very  slight  ex 
tent,  in  the  province  of  New  Hampshire.1  The  practice,  as 
we  have  seen,  originated  in  the  supposed  necessity  created  by 
Indian  hostilities  ;  but,  once  introduced,  it  was  banefully  cal 
culated  to  perpetuate  itself,  and  to  derive  accessions  from 
various  other  sources.  For  some  time,  indeed,  this  was  suc 
cessfully  resisted  ;  and  instances  have  been  recorded  of  judicial 
interposition  to  confine  the  mischief  within  its  original  limits. 
In  the  year  1645,  a  negro,  fraudfully  brought  from  Africa,  and 
enslaved  within  the  New  England  territory,  was  liberated  by 
the  magistrates  and  sent  back  to  his  native  country.2  No  law 
expressly  authorizing  slavery  was  ever  enacted  by  any  of  the 
New  England  States  ;  and  such  was  the  influence  of  religious 
and  moral  feeling  in  all  these  States,  that,  even  while  there  was 
no  law  prohibiting  the  continuance  of  slavery,  it  never  suc 
ceeded  in  gaining  any  considerable  prevalence.  To  this  end 
the  qualities  and  produce  of  the  soil  cooperated  with  the  moral 
sentiments  of  the  people,  who  were  not  exposed  to  the  same 
temptations  to  the  employment  of  slave  labor  that  presented 
themselves  in  the  Southern  provinces  of  America.  By  the 
early  laws  of  Connecticut,  man-stealing  was  declared  a  capital 
crime.  In  the  year  1703,  the  assembly  of  Massachusetts 
imposed  a  duty  of  four  pounds  on  every  negro  imported  into 
the  province  ;  and  nine  years  after,  passed  an  act  prohibiting 
the  importation  of  any  more  Indian  servants  or  slaves.3  In 

1  The  assembly  of  this  province,  as  early  as  the  reign  of  George  the  First, 
passed  a  law,  enacting,  that,  "if  any  man  smite  out  the  eye  or  tooth  of  his 
man  or  maid  servant,  or  otherwise  maim  or  disfigure  them,  he  shall  let  him  or 
her  go  free  from  his  service,  and  shall  allow  such  farther  recompense  as  the 
Court  of  Quarter  Sessions  shall  adjudge  ";  and  that,  "if  any  person  kill  his 
Indian  or  negro  servant,  he  shall  be  punished  with  death.  The  slaves  in 
this  province  are  said  to  have  been  treated  in  all  respects  like  white  servants. 
Warden's  United  States.  By  an  act  of  the  legislature  of  Rhode  Island,  in 
the  year  1704,  all  negroes  and  Indians  were  prohibited  from  being  abroad  after 
nine  o'clock  of  the  evening.  Collections  of  the  Rhode  Island  Historical  Society. 
Yet  Rhode  Island  writers  eagerly  vaunt  the  superior  equity  of  the  treatment 
experienced  by  the  Indians  from  their  countrymen. 

*  Belknap. 

3  Blue  Laws  of  Connecticut.  Holmes.  "  In  the  early  part  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  Judge  Sewell,  of  New  England,  came  forward  as  a  zealous  advocate 
for  the  negroes.  He  addressed  a  memorial  to  the  legislature,  which  he  enti 
tled  The  Selling  of  Joseph,  and  in  which  he  pleaded  their  cause  both  as  a  law 
yer  and  a  Christian.  This  memorial  produced  an  effect  upon  many,  but  par 
ticularly  upon  those  of  his  own  religious  persuasion."  Clarkson's  History  of 
the  Abolition  of  the  Slave  Trade. 


CHAP.  V.]  SLAVERY  IN  NEW  ENGLAND.  443 

Massachusetts,  the  slaves  never  exceeded  the  fiftieth  part  of 
the  whole  population  ;  in  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island,  when 
slaves  were  most  numerous  (about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century) ,  the  proportion  was  nearly  the  same  ;  and  in  the  ter 
ritory  that  afterwards  received  the  name  of  Vermont,  when 
the  number  of  inhabitants  amounted  to  nine  thousand,  there 
were  only  sixteen  persons  in  a  state  of  slavery.1  The  cruel 
ties  and  vices  that  slavery  tends  to  produce  were  repressed  at 
once  by  so  great  a  preponderance  of  the  sound  over  the  un 
healthy  part  of  the  body  politic,  and  by  the  moral  circumstan 
ces  to  which  this  preponderance  was  owing.  The  majority  of 
the  inhabitants  were  decidedly  hostile  to  slavery  ;  and  numer 
ous  remonstrances  were  addressed  to  the  British  government 
against  the  encouragement  she  afforded  to  it  by  supporting  the 
slave-trade.  When  North  America  attained  independence,  the 
New  England  States  adopted  measures,  which,  in  the  course 
of  a  few  years,  effected  the  abolition  of  this  vile  institution.2 

1  Warden.     Winterbotham's  America,    D wight. 

2  There  is  a  strange,  I  hope  not  a  disingenuous,  indistinctness  in  the  state 
ments  of  some  writers  respecting  the  negro  slavery  of  New  England.     Win- 
terbotham,  writing  in  1795,  asserts  that  "  there  are  no  slaves  in  Massachusetts. 
If  he  meant  that  a  law  had  been  passed  which  denounced  and  was  gradually 
extinguishing  slavery,  he  was  right ;  but  the  literal  sense  of  his  words  is  con 
tradicted  by  Warden's  Tables,  which  demonstrate  that  fifteen  years  after  (the 
law  not  yet  having  produced  its  full  effect)  there  were  several  thousand  slaves 
in  Massachusetts.     Dwight  relates  his  travels,  in  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
and  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  through  every  part  of  New  England, 
without  giving  us  the  slightest  reason  to  suppose  that  such  beings  as  slaves 
existed  in  any  one  of  its  provinces,  except  when  he  stops  to  defend  the  leg 
islature  of  Connecticut  from  an  imputation  on  the  manner  in  which  her  share 
of  the  abolition  of  slavery  had  been  conducted.     It  was  actually  conducted 
in  a  style  the  most  tenderly  regardful  of  the  iniquitous  interests  of  the  whites, 
and  disdainfully  negligent  of  the  just  rights  of  the  negroes.     Warden  himself 
says,  in  one  page,  that  "  slavery  no  longer  exists  in  New  England,"  even 
while,  in  another,  he  admits  and  seeks  to  palliate  the  occurrence  of  its  linger 
ing  traces  in  New  Hampshire. 

It  is  easier  to  commit  than  to  repair  injustice.  Obstinate  and  protracted  are 
its  consequential  evils.  Hatred,  contempt,  and  ill-usage  of  the  negro  race 
have  long  continued,  in  New  England  and  other  of  the  North  American  com 
munities,  to  survive  the  abolition  of  negro  slavery  within  their  limits.  See 
Note  XXL,  at  the  end  of  Vol.  IV. 


NOTES. 


NOTES 


TO 


THE    FIRST    VOLUME 


NOTE  I.     Page  18. 

THE  important  instruction,  both  moral  and  political,  which  may  be 
derived  from  a  consideration  of  the  origin  of  the  slave-trade,  is 
forcibly  depicted  by  that  distinguished  philanthropist  (Thomas  Clark- 
son)  whose  virtue  promoted,  and  whose  genius  has  recorded,  the 
abolition  of  this  detestable  traffic.  It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  the 
pious  and  benevolent  Las  Casas,  actuated  by  an  earnest  desire  to 
emancipate  the  feeble  natives  of  South  America  from  the  bondage 
of  the  Spanish  colonists,  was  the  first  person  who  proposed  to  the 
government  of  Spain  the  importation  of  negroes  from  Africa  to 
America.  His  proposition  was  rejected  by  Cardinal  Ximenes,  who 
considered  it  unlawful  to  consign  innocent  people  to  slavery  at  all, 
and  was,  moreover,  struck  with  the  moral  inconsistency  of  deliver 
ing  the  inhabitants  of  one  country  from  a  state  of  misery,  by  trans 
ferring  it  to  the  inhabitants  of  another.  "  After  the  death  of  Cardi 
nal  Ximenes,  the  Emperor  Charles  the  Fifth  encouraged  the  slave- 
trade.  In  1517,  he  granted  a  patent  to  one  of  his  Flemish  favor 
ites,  containing  an  exclusive  right  of  importing  four  thousand  Afri 
cans  into  America.  But  he  lived  long  enough  to  repent  of  what 
he  had  thus  inconsiderately  done.  For  in  the  year  1542,  he  made 
a  code  of  laws  for  the  better  protection  of  the  unfortunate  Indians 
in  his  foreign  dominions ;  and  he  stopped  the  progress  of  African 
slavery  by  an  order  that  all  slaves  in  his  American  islands  should 
be  made  free."  This  order  was  subsequently  defeated  by  his  own 
retirement  into  a  monastery ;  but  "  it  shows  he  had  been  ignorant 
of  what  he  was  doing,  when  he  gave  his  sanction  to  this  cruel  trade. 
It  shows,  when  legislators  give  one  set  of  men  an  undue  power 
over  another,  how  quickly  they  abuse  it ;  or  he  never  would  have 
found  himself  obliged,  in  the  short  space  of  twenty-five  years,  to 
undo  that  which  he  had  countenanced  as  a  great  state  measure. 
And  while  it  confirms  the  former  lesson  to  statesmen,  of  watching 
the  beginnings  or  principles  of  things,  in  their  political  movements, 


448  NOTES. 

it  should  teach  them  never  to  persist  in  the  support  of  evils,  through 
the  false  shame  of  being  obliged  to  confess  that  they  had  once 
given  them  their  sanction ;  nor  to  delay  the  cure  of  them,  because, 
politically  speaking,  neither  this  nor  that  is  the  proper  season  ;  but 
to  do  them  away  instantly,  as  there  can  be  only  one  fit  or  proper 
time  in  the  eye  of  religion,  namely,  on  the  conviction  of  their  ex 
istence." — Clarkson's  History  of  the  Abolition  of  the  Slave  Trade. 
Louis  the  Thirteenth  of  France  was  at  first  staggered  by  the 
same  scruples  of  conscience  that  prevailed  with  the  Emperor 
Charles,  and  could  not  be  persuaded  to  authorize  the  slave-trade 
till  he  was  induced  to  believe  that  he  would  promote  the  religious 
conversion  of  the  negroes  by  suffering  them  to  be  transported  to  the 
colonies.  —  Ibid. 


NOTE  II.     Page  55. 

CAPTAIN  SMITH  was  so  obnoxious  to  the  leading  patentees,  that, 
even  if  he  had  remained  in  the  colony,  it  is  highly  improbable  that 
they  would  ever  again  have  intrusted  him  with  official  authority. 
They  neither  rewarded  nor  reemployed  him  after  his  return  to 
England.  They  were  bent  on  deriving  immediate  supplies  of  gold 
or  rich  merchandise  from  Virginia;  and  ascribed  their  disappoint 
ment  in  a  great  measure  to  his  having  restricted  his  views  to  the 
establishment  of  a  solid  and  respectable  frame  of  provincial  socie 
ty.  This  is  apparent  from  many  passages  of  his  writings,  and  par 
ticularly  from  his  letter  to  the  patentees  while  he  held  the  presi 
dency.  An  honester  but  absurder  reason,  that  prompted  some  of 
them  to  oppose  his  pretensions  to  office,  was,  that  certain  fortune 
tellers  had  predicted  that  he  would  be  unlucky ;  a  prediction  that 
sometimes  contributes  to  its  own  fulfilment. 

In  various  parts  of  his  history,  Smith  applies  himself  to  refute 
their  unreasonable  charges,  and  account  for  the  disappointment  of 
their  expectations.  For  this  purpose  he  has  drawn  a  parallel  be 
tween  the  circumstances  of  the  Spanish  and  the  English  colonists 
of  America.  "  It  was  the  Spaniards'  good  hap,"  he  observes,  "  to 
happen  in  those  parts  where  were  infinite  numbers  of  people,  who 
had  manured  the  ground  with  that  providence  it  afforded  victuals 
at  all  times.  And  time  had  brought  them  to  that  perfection,  that 
they  had  the  use  of  gold  and  silver,  and  the  most  of  such  com 
modities  as  those  countries  afforded :  so  that  what  the  Spaniards  got 
was  chiefly  the  spoil  and  pillage  of  those  country  people,  and  not 
the  labors  of  their  own  hands.  But  had  these  fruitful  countries 
been  as  savage,  as  barbarous,  as  ill  peopled,  as  little  planted,  la 
bored,  and  manured,  as  Virginia,  their  proper  labors,  it  is  likely, 
would  have  produced  as  small  profit  as  ours.  And  had  Virginia 
been  peopled,  planted,  manured,  and  adorned  with  such  store  of 
precious  jewels  and  rich  commodities  as  were  the  Indies ;  then,  had 


NOTES.  449 

we  not  gotten  and  done  as  much  as,  by  their  examples,  might  be 
expected  from  us,  the  world  might  then  have  traduced  us  and  our 
merits,  and  have  made  shame  and  infamy  our  recompense  and  re 
ward." 

Were  we  to  confine  our  attention  to  the  superficial  import  of  this 
isolated  passage,  it  would  be  difficult  not  to  suppose  that  this  excel 
lent  person  was  deterred  less  by  want  of  inclination  than  by  lack 
of  opportunity  from  imitating  the  robberies  and  cruelties  of  the 
Spanish  adventurers.  But  the  general  strain  of  his  book,  as  well  as 
the  more  credible  evidence  supplied  by  the  whole  scope  and  tenor 
of  his  life,  would  fully  refute  the  unjust  supposition.  That  he  was 
unacquainted  with  the  enormities  committed  by  the  Spaniards  in 
Mexico  and  Peru  may  be  collected  from  the  praises  he  bestows  on 
their  exploits,  and  from  his  appealing  to  the  glory  of  these  exploits 
as  an  incentive  that  should  stimulate  the  ardor  of  the  English  in  the 
exercise  of  laborious  virtue,  and  the  prosecution  of  humble  but 
honest  emolument  in  North  America.  Thus  nobly  we  find  him  ex 
pressing  the  sentiments  of  a  mind  which  the  condition  of  humanity 
did  not  exempt  from  being  deceived,  but  which  piety  preserved 
from  gross  depravation  or  perversion  :  —  "  Who  can  desire  more 
content,  that  hath  small  means,  or  but  only  his  merit,  to  advance  his 
fortunes,  than  to  tread  and  plant  that  ground  he  hath  purchased  by 
the  hazard  of  his  life  ?  If  he  have  but  the  taste  of  virtue  and  mag 
nanimity,  what  to  such  a  mind  can  be  more  pleasant  than  planting 
and  building  a  foundation  for  his  posterity,  got  from  the  rude  earth 
by  God's  blessing  and  his  own  industry,  without  prejudice  to  any  ? 
If  he  have  any  grain  of  faith  or  zeal  in  religion,  what  can  he  do 
less  hurtful  to  any,  or  more  agreeable  to  God,  than  to  seek  to  con 
vert  those  poor  savages  to  know  Christ  and  humanity,  whose  labors 
with  discretion  will  triple  thy  charge  and  pains  ?  What  so  truly 
suits  with  honor  and  honesty  as  the  discovering  things  unknown, 
erecting  towns,  peopling  countries,  informing  the  ignorant,  reform 
ing  things  unjust,  teaching  virtue,  and  gaining  to  our  mother  coun 
try  a  kingdom  to  attend  her ;  finding  employment  for  those  that  are 
idle  because  they  know  not  what  to  do ;  so  far  from  wronging  any, 
as  to  cause  posterity  to  remember  thee,  and,  remembering  thee, 
ever  to  honor  that  remembrance  with  praise  ?  "  It  is  probably  such 
expressions  as  these  that  have  led  certain  writers  to  charge  Smith 
with  enthusiasm, —  a  term  by  which  some  persons  denote  every 
elevation  of  view  and  tone  that  religion  imparts,  —  and  by  which 
many  others  designate  every  quality  and  sentiment  above  the  pitch 
of  their  own  nature. 

Smith  proceeds  as  follows  :  —  "  Then  who  would  live  at  home 
idly,  or  think  in  himself  any  worth  to  live,  only  to  eat,  drink,  and 
sleep,  and  so  die ;  or  consuming  that  carelessly  his  friends  got 
worthily,  or  using  that  miserably  that  maintained  virtue  honestly ; 
or,  being  descended  nobly,  pine,  with  the  vain  vaunt  of  great  kin 
dred,  in  penury ;  or,  to  maintain  a  silly  show  of  bravery,  toil  out 
thy  heart,  soul,  and  time  basely,  by  shifts,  tricks,  cards,  and  dice ; 

VOL.   i.  57 


450  NOTES. 

or,  by  relating  news  of  other  men's  actions,  shark  here  and  there 
for  a  dinner  or  supper,"  &c.,  "  though  thou  seest  what  honors  and 
rewards  the  world  yet  hath  for  them  that  will  seek  them  and  worth 
ily  deserve  them  ?  "  He  adds,  shortly  after,  "  It  would  be  a  history 
of  a  large  volume,  to  recite  the  adventures  of  the  Spaniards  and 
Portugals,  their  affronts  and  defeats,  their  dangers  and  miseries, 
which,  with  such  incomparable  honor  and  constant  resolution,  so  far 
beyond  belief,  they  have  attempted  and  endured,  in  their  discover 
ies  and  plantations,  as  may  well  condemn  us  of  too  much  imbecili 
ty,  sloth,  and  negligence.  Yet  the  authors  of  these  new  inventions 
were  held  as  ridiculous  for  a  long  time,  as  now  are  others  that  but 
seek  to  imitate  their  unparalleled  virtues." 

I  should  contend  neither  wisely  nor  honestly  for  the  fame  of 
Captain  Smith,  were  I  to  represent  him  as  a  faultless  character, 
perfectly  divested  of  the  imperfections  of  humanity.  The  suffer 
ings  of  others  were  able  to  provoke  him  to  an  intemperance,  at  least 
of  language,  which  none  of  his  own  trials  and  provocations  ever  elicit 
ed,  and  with  which  none  of  his  actions  ever  corresponded.  Indig 
nant  at  the  cruel  massacre  of  the  Virginian  colonists  in  1622,  long 
after  he  had  left  them,  he  pronounced  in  haste  and  anger  that  the 
colony  could  not  be  preserved  without  subduing  or  expelling  the 
Indians,  and  punishing  their  perfidious  cruelty,  as  the  Spaniards  had 
punished  "  the  treacherous  and  rebellious  infidels  "  in  South  Ameri 
ca.  These  expressions  afford  a  farther  proof  of  the  very  imperfect 
acquaintance  he  had  with  the  real  circumstances  that  attended  the 
subjugation  of  South  America  by  the  Spaniards.  "  Notwithstand 
ing  such  a  stern  and  invincible  resolution  as  Captain  Smith  dis 
played,"  says  an  intelligent  historian  of  Virginia,  "  there  was  sel 
dom  seen  a  milder  and  more  tender  heart  than  his  was."  Stith. 

Smith  expatiates  at  great  length,  and  with  much  spirit  and  ability, 
on  the  advantages  of  colonial  establishments  in  America ;  and  pro 
pounds  a  variety  of  inducements  to  embark  in  them,  appropriate 
to  the  various  classes  of  society  in  England.  Colonies  he  charac 
terizes  as  schools  for  perpetuating  the  hardy  virtues  on  which  the 
safety  of  every  state  depends.  He  ascribes  the  fall  of  Rome  and 
the  subjugation  of  Constantinople  to  the  indolence  and  covetous- 
ness  of  the  rich,  who  not  only  passed  their  own  lives  in  slothful  in 
dulgence,  but  retained  the  poor  in  factious  idleness,  by  neglecting 
to  engage  them  in  safe  and  useful  employment ;  and  strongly  urges 
the  wealthy  capitalists  of  England  to  provide  for  their  own  security, 
by  facilitating  every  foreign  vent  to  the  energies  of  active  and  in 
digent  men.  He  enlarges  on  the  pleasures  incident  to  a  planter's 
life,  and  illustrates  his  description  by  the  testimony  of  his  own  ex 
perience.  "  I  have  not  been  so  ill-bred,"  he  declares,  "  but  I  have 
tasted  of  plenty  and  pleasure,  as  well  as  want  and  misery.  And 
lest  any  should  think  the  toil  might  be  insupportable,  I  assure  my 
self  there  are  who  delight  extremely  in  vain  pleasure,  that  take 
much  more  pains  in  England  to  enjoy  it  than  I  should  do  there  to 
gain  wealth  sufficient ;  and  yet  I  think  they  should  not  have  half 


NOTES.  461 

such  sweet  content."  To  gentlemen  he  proposes,  among  other  in 
ducements,  the  pleasures  of  fishing,  fowling,  and  hunting,  to  an 
unbounded  extent ;  and  to  laborers,  the  blessings  of  a  vacant  soil 
of  unequalled  cheapness  and  unsurpassed  fertility.  ,.  He  promises 
no  mines  to  tempt  sordid  avarice,  nor  conquests  to  allure  profligate 
ambition  ;  but  the  advantages  of  a  temperate  clime  and  of  a  secure 
and  exhaustless  subsistence,  —  the  wealth  that  agriculture  may  ex 
tract  from  the  land,  and  fisheries  from  the  sea.  "  Therefore,"  he 
concludes,  "  honorable  and  worthy  countrymen,  let  not  the  mean 
ness  of  the  word  fish  distaste  you ;  for  it  will  afford  as  good  gold  as 
the  mines  of  Guiana  or  Potosi,  with  less  hazard  and  charge,  and 
more  certainty  and  facility." 

I  have  given  but  a  mere  outline  of  Smith's  exposition  of  this 
subject.  The  details  with  which  he  has  filled  it  up  are  highly  in 
teresting  and  well  deserving  of  perusal.  I  think  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  he  has  treated  the  subject  of  colonization  with  more  both 
of  the  practical  skill  of  a  politician  and  the  profound  sagacity  of 
a  philosopher,  than  Lord  Bacon  has  shown  in  either  or  both  of  his 
productions,  the  Essay  on  Plantations,  and  the  Considerations 
touching  the  Plantation  in  Ireland. 

The  name  of  Smith  has  not  yet  gathered  all  its  fame.  The 
lustre  it  once  possessed  is  somewhat  obscured  by  time,  and  by  the 
circumstances  that  left  America  so  long  to  depend  on  England  for 
the  sentiments  and  opinions  that  literature  preserves  or  produces, 
and  consequently  led  her  to  rate  her  eminent  men  rather  by  the 
importance  of  their  achievements  in  the  scale  of  British  than  of 
American  history.  But  Smith's  renown  will  break  forth  again,  and 
once  more  be  commensurate  with  his  desert.  It  will  grow  with  the 
growth  of  men  and  letters  in  America ;  and  whole  nations  of  its  ad 
mirers  have  yet  to  be  born.  As  the  stream  becomes  more  illus 
trious,  the  springs  will  be  reckoned  more  interesting. 

Smith  was  born  in  the  year  1579,  and  died  on  the  21st  of  June, 
1631. 


NOTE  III.    Page  60. 

ROBERTSON'S  credit  as  a  historian  is  not  a  little  impeached  by 
the  strange  inaccuracy  of  his  account  of  Sir  Thomas  Dale's  ad 
ministration.  He  not  only  imputes  to  the  Company  the  composition 
and  introduction  of  the  arbitrary  code  transmitted  by  Sir  Thomas 
Smith,  but  unfolds  at  length  the  (imaginary)  reasons  that  prevailed 
with  them  to  adopt  a  measure  so  harsh  and  sanguinary  ;  though  of 
this  measure  itself  they  are  expressly  acquitted  by  Stith,  the  only 
authority  on  the  subject  that  exists,  and  the  very  authority  to  whom 
Robertson  himself  refers.  Among  the  other  reasons  which  he 
assigns  is  the  advice  of  Lord  Bacon,  which  he  unhesitatingly 
charges  this  eminent  person  with  having  communicated,  and 


452  NOTES. 

the  Company  with  having  approved.  In  support  of  an  accusation 
so  distinct  and  so  remarkable,  he  refers  merely  to  a  passage 
in  Lord  Bacon's  Essay  on  Plantations.  It  would  be  well  for 
the  fame  of  Bacon,  if  all  the  charges  with  which  his  character 
is  loaded  were  supported  only  by  such  evidence.  For,  supposing 
(which  is  doubtful)  that  this  essay  was  published  before  the  collec 
tion  of  Sir  Thomas  Smith's  system  of  martial  law,  and  supposing 
it  to  have  been  read  by  the  compiler  of  that  system,  it  is  surely 
more  than  doubtful  if  the  passage  alluded  to  would  yet  support  Dr. 
Robertson's  imputation.  It  merely  recommends  that  a  provincial 
government  should  "  have  commission  to  exercise  martial  laws, 
with  some  limitation  "  ;  a  power  inseparable  from  such,  and  indeed 
from  every  system  of  government.  The  twenty-fourth  section  of 
King  James's  second  charter  to  the  Company  had  already  invested 
the  provincial  governors  with  "  full  power  and  authority  to  use  and 
exercise  martial  law,  in  cases  of  mutiny  or  rebellion  "  ;  and  the  pre 
ceding  section  of  the  same  charter  authorizes  them,  "  in  case  of 
necessity,"  to  rule,  correct,  and  punish,  according  to  their  own 
"  good  discretions."  No  blame  can  attach  to  the  bare  authorization 
of  an  extraordinary  power,  reserved  in  every  society,  for  extraordi 
nary  occasions.  What  alone  seems  deserving  of  blame  is  Sir 
Thomas  Smith's  violent  and  illegal  substitution  of  the  most  sangui 
nary  code  of  martial  law  that  was  ever  framed,  in  the  room  of  the 
original  constitution,  and  for  the  ordinary  government  of  the  colony  ; 
and  Dr.  Robertson's  very  hasty  and  unfounded  imputation  of  this 
measure  to  the  act  of  the  council  and  the  advice  of  Lord  Bacon. 
It  had  been  well,  if  the  council  had  paid  more  attention  to  the  maxim 
of  this  great  man,  that  "  Those  who  plant  colonies  must  be  en 
dued  with  great  patience." 


NOTE  IV.     Page  149. 

AN  illustration  of  this  remark  may  perhaps  be  derived  from 
the  apologetic  theory  philosophical  slave-owners  have  introduced 
into  the  world,  —  that  the  negroes  are  a  separate  and  inferior  race 
of  men ;  a  notion  by  which  the  degradation  that  human  beings  in 
flict  on  their  fellows,  in  reducing  them  to  the  level  of  the  brute 
creation,  is  charged  upon  God,  whose  word  assures  us  that  he  cre 
ated  man  after  his  own  image,  and  that  he  fashioned  all  souls  alike. 
Interest  and  pride  harden  the  heart ;  a  deceived  heart  perverts  the 
understanding ;  and  men  are  easily  persuaded  to  consider  those  as 
brutes  whom  they  deem  it  convenient  to  treat  as  such.  The  best 
refutation  of  this  theory  that  I  have  ever  seen  is  the  production 
of  an  American  writer.  It  occurs  in  Dr.  S.  Smith's  interesting 
Essay  on  the  Causes  of  the  Variety  of  Figure  and  Complexion  in 
the  Human  Species.  See,  also,  on  the  same  subject,  Clarkson's 
Researches,  Antediluvian,  Patriarchal,  &c. 


NOTES.  453 

In  his  Notes  on  Virginia,  Mr.  Jefferson  has  contended  for  the 
natural  inferiority  of  negroes  to  white  men.  But  I  was  assured 
by  the  Abbe  Gregoire  (formerly  Bishop  of  Blois),  that  Jefferson, 
in  a  private  letter  to  him,  confessed  that  he  had  seen  cause  to  alter 
this  opinion.  Anthony  Benezet,  the  Quaker,  himself  a  very  in 
genious  and  accomplished  man,  who  had  conversed  extensively 
with  negroes  in  America,  and  undertaken  the  education  of  a  great 
number  of  them,  pronounced,  as  the  result  of  his  experience,  that 
this  race  is  perfectly  equal  to  the  whites  in  all  the  endowments  of 
nature ;  the  prevalence  of  an  opposite  opinion  he  ascribed  partly 
to  the  debasing  effect  of  slavery  on  the  minds  of  the  negroes, 
and  partly  to  the  influence  of  ignorance,  pride,  and  cruelty  on  those 
white  men  who,  pluming  themselves  on  a  wide  separation  from  the 
negroes,  are  incompetent  to  form  a  sound  judgment  on  the  capaci 
ties  of  this  race.  Vaux's  Life  of  Benezet.  Man  (alas!)  seems  to 
be  the  only  creature  capable  of  provoking  from  his  fellow-man 
such  cruelty  as  the  blacks  have  experienced  from  the  whites. 

Most  of  the  advocates  or  apologists  of  slavery  maintain  that  en 
slaved  negroes  are  generally  contented  with  their  lot,  —  a  statement, 
which,  if  correct,  might^well  be  cited  in  proof  of  the  corrupting  effect 
of  slavery  on  ordinary  minds.  Who  regards  otherwise  than  with  pity 
and  contempt  the  depraved  longings  of  the  emancipated  Israelites 
for  a  return  to  the  ignominy  of  Egyptian  bondage  ?  The  con 
tentment  of  a  slave  in  his  degraded  estate  proves  that  the  iron  has 
entered  into  his  soul.  "  If  thou  mayest  be  free,"  says  an  inspired 
Apostle,  "use  it  rather."  A  distinguished  American  writer,  whom 
I  respect  so  highly  as  to  be  unwilling  to  name  him  on  the  present 
occasion,  has  so  far  misused  his  admirable  ingenuity  as  to  maintain 
that  slavery  may  prove  a  blessing  to  the  country  in  which  it  exists, 
and  elevate  human  character,  by  affording  opportunity  to  the  mas 
ters  of  generous  self-control,  and  to  the  slaves  of  grateful  recog 
nition  of  the  indulgent  forbearance  of  their  masters.  To  be  con 
sistent  (an  impossibility  to  a  North  American  advocate  of  slavery), 
this  accomplished  writer  should  demand  an  alteration  of  the  Lord's 
prayer,  and,  instead  of  the  petition,  "  Lead  us  not  into  temptation, 
but  deliver  us  from  evil,"  propose  as  our  orison,  "  Let  us  fall  into 
temptation,  that  we  may  deliver  ourselves  from  evil." 

Many  Americans,  while  they  cling  to  the  vile  institution  of  negro 
slavery  (asserting,  with  horrible  sophistry,  the  sacredness  of  a  man's 
pretension  to  an  artificial  right  of  property  in  the  violent  privation 
of  another  man's  natural  right  of  property  in  his  own  liberty),  are 
eager  to  impute  its  existence,  or  at  least  its  extent,  among  them,  to 
the  policy  and  conduct  of  the  British  government,  in  encouraging 
the  slave-trade,  and  disregarding  the  remonstrances  against  it  that 
were  addressed  to  them  by  certain  of  the  American  provinces. 
But  they  urge  this  apologetic  plea  a  great  deal  too  far.  Britain 
could  not  force  her  colonial  offspring  to  become  slaveholders, 
though  she  might  (and  did)  facilitate  their  acquisition  of  slaves. 


454  NOTES. 

''Every  man,"  says  the  word  of  God,  "is  tempted,  when  he  is 
drawn  away  of  his  own  lust,  and  enticed."  By  far  the  greater 
part  of  the  remonstrances  unsuccessfully  addressed  to  the  British 
government  were  the  suggestions  of  men  who  themselves  pos 
sessed  abundance  of  slaves,  and  who  were  desirous  of  preventing 
others  from  rivalling  them  in  wealth,  and  from  endangering  the 
stability  of  slavery,  by  additional  importations  of  negroes  unac 
customed  to  the  yoke.  I  have  heard  many  slave-owners  vehe 
mently  profess  a  sincere  desire  to  discover  some  practicable  plan 
of  abolishing  slavery ;  but  almost  invariably  found  that  they  re 
quired  the  impracticability  of  repairing  long  and  enormous  injus 
tice  without  any  atoning  sacrifice  or  reparatory  expense. 


NOTE  V.     Page  200. 

CHALMERS  and  Robertson  have  ascribed  the  slow  increase  of  the 
colonists  of  New  Plymouth  to  "  the  unsocial  character  of  their 
religious  confederacy."  As  the  charge  of  entertaining  antisocial 
principles  was  preferred  against  the  first  Christians  by  men  who 
plumed  themselves  on  exercising  hospitality  to  the  gods  of  all  na 
tions,  it  is  necessary  to  ascertain  the  precise  meaning  of  this  im 
putation  against  the  American  colonists,  if  we  would  know  wheth 
er  it  be  praise  or  blame  that  it  involves.  Whether,  in  a  truly 
blameworthy  acceptation,  the  charge  of  unsocial  principles  most 
properly  belongs  to  these  people  or  to  their  adversaries  may  be 
collected  from  the  statements  they  have  respectively  made  of  the 
terms  on  which  they  were  willing  to  hold  a  companionable  inter 
course  with  their  fellow-men.  Winslow,  who  was  for  some  time 
governor  of  New  Plymouth,  in  his  account  of  the  colony,  declares 
that  the  faith  of  the  people  was  in  all  respects  the  same  with  that 
of  the  reformed  churches  of  Europe,  from  which  they  differed 
only  in  their  opinion  of  church  government,  wherein  they  pur 
sued  a  more  thorough  reformation.  They  disclaimed,  however, 
any  uncharitable  separation  from  those  with  whom  they  differed  on 
this  point,  and  freely  admitted  the  members  of  every  reformed 
church  to  communion  with  them.  "  We  ever  placed,"  he  con 
tinues,  "  a  large  difference  between  those  that  grounded  their  prac 
tice  on  the  word  of  God,  though  differing  from  us  in  the  expo 
sition  and  understanding  of  it,  and  those  that  hated  such  reform 
ers  and  reformation,  and  went  on  in  antichristian  opposition  to  it 
and  persecution  of  it.  It  is  true,  we  profess  and  desire  to  practise 
a  separation  from  the  world  and  the  works  of  the  world  ;  and  as 
the  churches  of  Christ  are  all  saints  by  calling,  so  we  desire  to 
see  the  grace  of  God  shining  forth  (at  least  seemingly,  leaving 
secret  things  to  God)  in  all  whom  we  admit  into  church-fellowship 
with  us,  and  to  keep  off  such  as  openly  wallow  in  the  mire  of  their 


NOTES.  455 

sins,  that  neither  the  holy  things  of  God  nor  the  communion  of  saints 
may  be  leavened  or  polluted  thereby."  He  adds,  that  none  of  the 
settlers  who  were  admitted  into  the  church  of  New  Plymouth  were 
encouraged,  or  even  permitted,  to  insert  in  the  declaration  of  their 
faith  a  renunciation  of  the  church  of  England,  or  of  any  other 
reformed  establishment.  Mather.  It  does  not  appear  to  me  that 
these  sentiments  warrant  the  charge  of  unsocial  principles  in  any 
sense  which  a  Christian  will  feel  himself  at  all  concerned  to  dis 
claim.  Whether  the  adversaries  of  these  men  were  distinguished 
for  principles  more  honorably  social  or  more  eminently  charitable 
may  be  gathered  from  a  passage  in  Howel's  Familiar  Letters, 
where  this  defender  of  royalty  and  episcopacy  thus  expresses  the 
sentiments  of  his  party  respecting  religious  differences  between  man 
kind  :  —  "I  rather  pity  than  hate  a  Turk  or  infidel ;  for  they  are  of 
the  same  metal  and  bear  the  same  stamp  as  I  do,  though  the  in 
scriptions  differ.  If  I  hate  any,  it  is  those  schismatics  that  puzzle 
the  sweet  peace  of  our  church ;  so  that  I  could  be  content  to  see 
an  Anabaptist  go  to  hell  on  a  Brownist's  back."  The  ecclesiastical 
policy  of  the  monarchs  and  prelates  of  England  tendered  a  pre 
mium  to  the  production  of  such  sentiments.  Howel's  fervor  for 
the  church  party  did  not  survive  the  power  of  this  party  to  reward 
him.  After  the  fall  of  the  English  church  and  monarchy,  he  be 
came  the  defender  and  panegyrist  of  the  administration  of  Crom 
well  ;  though,  like  Waller  and  Dryden,  he  returned  in  the  train  of 
fortune,  when  she  returned  to  his  original  friends. 


NOTE  VI.    Page  237. 

THE  introduction  of  this  feature  into  the  portrait  of  Sir  Henry 
Vane  rests  entirely  on  the  authority  of  Burnet  and  Kennet  (fol 
lowed  by  Hume),  who  speak  from  hearsay.  Ludlow,  who  knew 
Vane  personally,  bestows  the  highest  praise  on  his  imperturbable 
serenity  and  presence  of  mind ;  and,  with  the  sympathy  of  a  kin 
dred  spirit,  describes  the  resolute  magnanimity  with  which  at  his 
trial  he  sealed  his  own  fate  by  scorning  to  plead,  like  Lambert,  for 
his  life,  and  gallantly  pleading  for  the  dying  liberties  of  his  coun 
try.  At  his  execution,  when  some  of  his  friends  expressed  resent 
ment  of  the  injuries  that  were  heaped  upon  him,  —  "  Alas  !  "  said  he, 
"  what  ado  they  keep  to  make  a  poor  creature  like  his  Saviour  !  I 
bless  the  Lord  I  am  so  far  from  being  affrighted  at  death,  that  I 
find  it  rather  shrink  from  me  than  I  from  it.  Ten  thousand  deaths 
for  me,  before  I  will  defile  the  chastity  and  purity  of  my  con 
science  ;  nor  would  I  for  ten  thousand  worlds  part  with  the  peace 
and  satisfaction  I  have  now  in  my  heart."  Perhaps  the  deep  piety 
and  constant  negation  of  all  merit  in  himself,  by  which  the  heroism 
of  Vane  was  softened  and  ennobled,  may  have  suggested  to  minds 


456  NOTES. 

unacquainted  with  these  principles  the  imputation  of  constitutional 
timidity.  At  all  events,  this  cloud,  whether  naturally  attendant 
on  his  character  or  artificially  raised  by  the  envious  breath  of  his 
detractors,  has,  from  the  admirable  vigor  of  his  mind  and  the  un 
questioned  courage  of  his  demeanour,  served  rather  to  embellish 
than  to  obscure  the  lustre  of  his  fame. 

Hugh  Peters,  like  Sir  Henry  Vane,  has  been  charged  with  de 
fect  of  courage.  Bishop  Burnet,  in  particular,  reproaches  him 
with  cowardice  at  his  execution.  Yet,  in  reality,  his  death  was  digni 
fied  by  a  courage  such  as  Burnet  never  knew,  and  which  dis 
tinguished  him  even  among  the  regicides.  After  his  fellow-sufferer, 
Cook,  had  been  quartered  before  his  face,  the  executioner  ap 
proached  him,  and,  rubbing  his  bloody  hands,  said,  "  Come,  Mr. 
Peters,  how  do  you  like  this  work  ?  "  Peters  answered,  "  I  thank 
God  I  am  not  terrified  at  it ;  you  may  do  your  worst."  Shortly 
before  he  died,  addressing  a  friend  who  attended  him,  he  said,  "  Re 
turn  straightway  to  New  England,  and  trust  God  there."  Prefixed 
to  a  posthumous  work  of  Peters,  entitled  A  dying  Father's  last 
Legacy  to  his  Daughter,  is  a  poetical  tribute  to  the  author,  thus 
concluding :  — 

"  Yet  his  last  breathings  shall,  like  incense  hurled 
On  sacred  altars,  so  perfume  the  world, 
That  the  next  will  admire,  and,  out  of  doubt, 
Revere  that  torchlight  which  this  age  put  out." 


NOTE  VII.     Page  282. 

THE  accounts  of  the  first  conversations  which  the  missionaries 
held  with  various  tribes  of  these  heathens  abound  with  curious 
questions  and  observations  that  proceeded  from  the  Indians  in  re 
lation  to  the  tidings  that  were  brought  to  their  ears.  One  man 
asked,  Whether  Englishmen  were  ever  so  ignorant  of  Jesus  Christ 
as  the  Indians.  A  second,  Whether  Jesus  Christ  could  understand 
prayers  in  the  Indian  language.  A  third  proposed  this  question, 
How  there  could  be  an  image  of  God,  since  it  was  forbidden  in 
the  second  commandment.  On  another  occasion,  after  Mr.  Eliot 
had  done  speaking,  an  aged  Indian  started  up,  and  with  tears  in 
his  eyes  asked,  Whether  it  was  not  too  late  for  such  an  old  man  as 
he,  who  was  near  death,  to  repent  and  seek  after  God.  A  second 
asked,  How  the  English  came  to  differ  so  much  from  the  Indians 
in  their  knowledge  of  God  and  Jesus  Christ,  since  they  had  all  at 
first  but  one  father.  A  third  desired  to  be  informed,  How  it  came 
to  pass  that  sea-water  was  salt  and  river-water  fresh.  Several 
inquired,  How  Judas  could  deserve  blame  for  prompting  the  ac 
complishment  of  the  purpose  of  God.  One  woman  asked,  Wheth- 


NOTES.  457 

er  she  was  entitled  to  consider  herself  as  having  prayed,  when  she 
merely  joined  in  her  mind  with  her  husband  who  prayed  by  her 
side.  Another,  If  her  husband's  prayer  signified  any  thing  while 
he  continued  to  beat  his  wife.  Many  of  the  converts  continued 
to  believe  that  the  gods  whom  they  formerly  served  had  in  reality 
considerable  power,  but  were  spirits  subordinate  to  the  true  and 
only  God ;  and  when  threatened  with  witchcraft  by  the  Powwows 
for  their  apostasy,  they  said,  "  We  do  not  deny  your  power,  but  we 
serve  a  greater  God,  who  is  so  much  above  your  deities  that  he  cart 
defend  us  from  them,  and  even  enable  us  to  trample  upon  them  all." 
One  sachem  sent  for  an  Indian  convert,  and  desired  to  know  how 
many  gods  the  English  had.  When  he  heard  they  had  but  one, 
he  replied  scornfully,  "Is  that  all?  I  have  thirty-seven.  Do 
they  suppose  I  would  exchange  so  many  for  one  ? "  Other  sa 
chems  rejected  the  instructions  of  the  missionaries  with  angry  dis 
dain,  saying,  that  "the  English  had  taken  away  their  lands  and 
were  attempting  now  to  make  them  slaves." 

The  efforts  of  missionaries  among  the  Indians  have  always 
been  obstructed  by  the  erroneous  ideas  of  liberty  fondly  cherished 
by  these  savages ;  who,  professing  the  most  exalted  estimate  of  this 
blessing,  and  having  its  name  continually  in  their  mouths,  have 
always  ignorantly  restricted  it  to  a  debased  and  impoverished  sense. 
"  The  Indians  are  convinced,"  says  Charlevoix,  "  that  man  is  born 
free,  that  no  power  on  earth  has  a  right  to  infringe  his  liberty, 
and  that  nothing  can  compensate  the  loss  of  it ;  and  it  has  been 
found  a  very  difficult  matter  to  undeceive  even  the  Christians  among 
them,  and  to  make  them  understand  how,  by  a  natural  consequence 
of  the  corruption  of  our  nature,  which  is  the  effect  of  sin,  an  un 
bridled  liberty  of  doing  wrong  differs  very  little  from  an  obligation 
to  commit  it,  because  of  the  strength  of  the  bias  which  draws  us 
to  it ;  and  that  the  law  which  restrains  us  causes  us  to  approach 
nearer  to  our  original  state  of  liberty,  whilst  it  appears  to  take 
it  from  us."  Charlevoix's  Travels. 


NOTE  VIII.     Page  300. 

"  GEORGE  Fox,"  says  William  Penn,  doubtless  with  especial  refer 
ence  to  the  advanced  age  and  matured  character  of  the  subject 
of  his  description,  "was  a  man  whom  God  endowed  with  a  clear 
and  wonderful  depth,  —  a  discoverer  of  other  men's  spirits,  and 
very  much  a  master  of  his  own.  The  reverence  and  solemni 
ty  of  his  address  and  behaviour,  and  the  fewness  and  fulness  of 
his  words,  often  struck  strangers  with  admiration.  He  was  civil 
beyond  all  forms  of  breeding  in  his  behaviour,  very  temperate, 
eating  little  and  sleeping  less,  although  a  bulky  person." 

The  character  of  George  Fox  is  certainly  neither  justly  nor  gener 
ally  understood  in  the  present  day.  His  writings  are  so  voluminous, 
VOL.  i.  58 


458  NOTES. 

and  there  is  such  a  mixture  of  good  and  evil  in  them,  that  every 
reader  finds  it  easy  to  justify  his  preconceived  opinion,  and  to  fortify 
it  by  appropriate  quotations.  His  works  are  read  by  few,  and  wholly 
read  by  still  fewer.  Many  derive  their  conception  of  his  charac 
ter  from  the  passages  which  are  cited  from  his  writings  by  his  ad 
versaries  ;  and  of  the  Quakers  not  a  few  are  content  to  judge  him 
from  the  passages  of  a  different  complexion  which  are  cited  in  the 
works  of  the  modern  writers  of  their  own  sect.  I  shall  here  sub 
join  a  few  extracts  from  his  Journal,  which  will  verify  some  of  the 
remarks  I  have  made  in  the  text ;  premising  this  observation,  that 
the  book  itself  was  first  put  into  my  hands  by  a  zealous  and  intelli 
gent  Quaker,  for  the  purpose  of  proving  to  me  that  it  contained  no 
such  passages  as  some  of  those  which  I  am  now  to  transcribe 
from  it. 

Fox  relates,  that  in  the  year  1648  he  found  his  nature  so  com 
pletely  new  modelled,  that  "  I  knew  nothing  but  pureness,  inno- 
cency,  and  righteousness,  being  renewed  up  into  the  image  of  God 
by  Christ  Jesus ;  so  that  I  was  come  up  to  the  state  of  Adam  which 
he  was  in  before  he  fell.  The  creation  was  opened  to  me  ;  and  it 
was  showed  me  how  all  things  had  their  names  given  them  accord 
ing  to  their  nature  and  virtue.  I  was  at  a  stand  in  my  mind  wheth 
er  I  should  practise  physic  for  the  good  of  mankind,  seeing  the 
nature  and  virtues  of  the  creatures  were  so  opened  to  me  by  the 
Lord.  But  I  was  immediately  taken  up  in  spirit  to  see  another  or 
more  steadfast  state  than  Adam's  in  innocency,  even  into  a  state  in 
Christ  Jesus  that  should  never  fall.  The  Lord  showed  me  that 
such  as  were  faithful  to  him  in  the  power  and  light  of  Christ  should 
come  up  into  that  state  in  which  Adam  was  before  he  fell ;  in 
which  the  admirable  works  of  the  creation  and  the  virtues  thereof 
may  be  known  through  the  openings  of  that  divine  word  of  wisdom 
and  power  by  which  they  were  made."  In  many  of  the  disputes 
which  he  afterwards  held  with  ministers  and  doctors,  he  maintained 
that  he  was,  and  that  every  human  being,  by  cultivation  of  the 
spiritual  principle  within  his  breast,  might  become,  like  him,  per 
fectly  pure  and  free  from  all  dregs  of  sin.  He  relates  with  com 
placency  and  approbation,  that,  having  one  day  addressed  a  congre 
gation  of  people  at  Beverley,  in  Yorkshire,  the  audience  declared 
afterwards  that  it  was  an  angel  or  spirit  that  had  suddenly  ap 
peared  among  them  and  spoken  to  them.  He  conceived  himself 
warranted  by  his  endowments  to  trample  on  all  order  and  decency. 
One  Sunday,  as  he  approached  the  town  of  Nottingham,  he  tells, 
"  I  espied  the  great  steeple-house ;  and  the  Lord  said  unto  me,  Thou 
must  go  cry  against  yonder  great  idol,  and  against  the  worshippers 
therein."  He  accordingly  entered  the  church,  and,  hearing  ihe 
minister  announce  the  text,  We  have  also  a  more  sure  word  of 
prophecy,  and  tell  the  people  that  by  this  was  meant  the  Scriptures, 
whereby  they  were  to  try  all  doctrines,  religions,  and  opinions, 
Fox  adds,  "  I  could  not  hold,  but  was  made  to  cry  out, '  O,  no !  it 
is  not  the  Scriptures  :  it  is  the  Holy  Spirit.' "  On  another  occasion, 


NOTES. 

having  entered  a  church,  and  hearing  the  preacher  read  for  his  text, 
Ho  !  every  one  that  thirsteth,  come  ye  to  the  waters,  &c.,  Fox  called 
out  to  him,  "Come  down,  thou  deceiver!  dost  thou  bid  people 
come  freely  and  take  of  the  water  of  life  freely,  and  yet  thou  takest 
three  hundred  pounds  a  year  of  them  for  preaching  the  Scriptures 
to  them  ?  "  Approaching  the  town  of  Lichfield,  he  declares  he 
found  himself  spiritually  directed  to  cast  off  his  shoes,  and  in  that 
condition  walk  through  the  streets,  exclaiming,  "  Woe  to  the  bloody 
city  of  Lichfield !  "  which  he  accordingly  did.  These  examples 
are  selected  almost  at  random  from  numberless  instances  of  similar 
proceedings  recorded  in  his  voluminous  journal.  Yet  he  strongly 
condemns  the  frantic  extravagance  of  the  Ranters,  and  relates  vari 
ous  attempts  he  had  made  to  convince  them  of  their  delusion. 
Journal. 

William  Penn,  in  the  beautiful  Preface  which  he  wrote  for  this 
Journal,  informs  us  that  these  Ranters  were  persons,  who,  "  for  want 
of  staying  their  minds  in  a  humble  dependence  upon  Him  that 
opened  their  understandings  to  see  great  things  in  his  law,  ran  out 
in  their  own  imaginations,  and,  mixing  them  with  these  divine 
openings,  brought  forth  a  monstrous  birth,  to  the  scandal  of  those 
that  feared  God."  "  Divers,"  he  adds,  "  fell  into  gross  and  enor 
mous  practices,  pretending  in  excuse  thereof  that  they  could  without 
evil  commit  the  same  act  which  was  sin  in  another  to  do."  "  I  say," 
he  continues,  "  this  ensnared  divers,  and  brought  them  to  an  utter 
and  lamentable  loss  as  to  their  eternal  state ;  and  they  grew  very 
troublesome  to  the  better  sort  of  people,  and  furnished  the  looser 
with  an  occasion  to  blaspheme." 

Fox  himself  relates  some  horrid  immoralities  of  the  Ranters,  and 
that  he  had  found  it  necessary  to  publish  addresses  conveying  as 
surance  to  the  world  that  these  deluded  persons  were  Quakers  only 
in  name.  Journal.  He  applies  the  epithet  of  Ranters  to  many  of 
those  who  called  themselves  Quakers  in  America.  Some  of  Fox's 
chief  associates  and  coadjutors  appear  to  have  become  in  the  end 
Ranters,  or  something  worse.  Of  these  was  James  Naylor,  long  the 
fellow-laborer  and  fellow-sufferer  of  Fox,  and  whom  Fox  still  terms 
a  Quaker,  at  the  time  when  he  was  in  prison  for  blasphemy  and  ob 
scenity.  Fox  alludes  vaguely  and  sorrowfully  to  Naylor's  errors 
and  disobedience  to  him.  When  he  found  that  Naylor  would  not 
give  heed  to  his  rebukes,  Fox  told  him  that  "  the  Lord  moved  me 
to  slight  him,  and  to  set  the  power  of  God  over  him."  He  adds, 
that  it  soon  after  happened  to  Naylor  that  "  his  resisting  the  power 
of  God  in  me,  and  the  truth  of  God  that  was  declared  to  him  by 
me,  became  one  of  his  greatest  burdens."  Journal.  Naylor  had 
ridden  naked  into  Bristol  with  a  crew  of  insane  followers,  uttering 
blasphemous  proclamations  before  him,  and  had  gloried  in  the 
commission  of  abominable  impurities.  On  his  trial,  he  produced  a 
woman,  one  Dorcas  Barberry,  who  declared  on  oath  that  she  had 
been  dead  two  days,  and  was  recalled  to  life  by  Naylor. 

It  is  not  easy  to  discover  what  part  of  the  extravagance  of  Nay- 


460  NOTES. 

lor  was  condemned  by  Fox  and  the  proper  body  of  the  Quakers. 
We  find  Fox  relating  with  great  approbation  many  wild  and  ab 
surd  exhibitions  by  which  Quakers  were  moved,  as  they  said,  to 
show  themselves  as  signs  of  the  times.  "  Some,"  he  informs  us, 
"  have  been  moved  to  go  naked  in  the  streets,  and  have  declared 
amongst  them  that  God  would  strip  them  of  their  hypocritical  pro 
fessions,  and  make  them  as  bare  and  naked  as  they  were.  But  in 
stead  of  considering  it,  they  have  frequently  whipped,  or  otherwise 
abused  them."  Journal.  Many  such  instances  he  relates  in  the 
Journal,  with  cordial  commendation  of  the  insane  indecency  of  the 
Quakers,  and  the  strongest  reprobation  of  the  persecutors  who  pun 
ished  them  for  walking  abroad  in  a  state  of  corporeal  nudity. 

Fox  taught  that  God  did  not  create  the  devil.  Yet,  though  the 
reasoning  by  which  he  defends  this  gross  heresy  would  plainly 
seem  to  imply  that  the  devil  was  a  self-created  being,  there  is 
another  passage  in  his  writings  from  which  we  may  perhaps  con 
clude  that  Fox's  deliberate  opinion  was,  that  the  devil  was  created 
by  God  a  good  spirit,  but  transformed  himself  by  his  own  will  into 
a  wicked  one.  He  records  every  misfortune  that  happened  to  any 
of  his  adversaries  or  persecutors  as  a  judgment  of  Heaven  upon 
them.  He  relates  various  cures  of  sick  and  wounded  persons  that 
ensued  on  his  prayers,  and  on  more  ordinary  means  that  he  em 
ployed  for  their  relief.  It  may  be  doubted  if  he  himself  regarded 
these  as  the  exertions  of  miraculous  power;  but  from  many  pas 
sages  it  is  plain  that  they  were  (to  his  knowledge)  so  regarded  by 
his  followers,  and  the  Quaker  editor  of  his  Journal  refers  to  them 
in  the  Index  under  the  head  of  "  Miracles." 

I  think  it  not  unreasonable  to  consider  Quakerism,  the  growth 
of  a  Protestant  country,  and  Quietism,  which  arose  among  Catho 
lics,  as  branches  of  a  system  essentially  the  same ;  and  Madame 
Guyon  and  Molinos  as  the  counterparts  of  Fox  and  Barclay.  The 
moral  resemblance  is  plainer  than  the  historical  connection ;  but  the 
propagation  of  sentiment  and  opinion  may  be  effectually  accom 
plished  when  it  is  not  visibly  indicated.  Quietism  was  first  en 
gendered  in  Spain  among  a  sect  called  the  Hluminati,  or  Alumbra- 
dos,  who  sprang  up  about  the  year  1575.  They  rejected  sacra 
ments  and  other  ordinances ;  and  some  of  them  became  notorious 
for  indecent  and  immoral  extravagances.  This  sect  was  revived 
in  France  in  the  year  1634,  but  quickly  disappeared  under  a  hot 
persecution.  It  reappeared  again,  with  a  system  of  doctrine  con 
siderably  purified  (yet  still  inculcating  the  distinctive  principle  of 
exclusive  teaching  by  an  inward  light  and  sensible  impression), 
towards  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century,  both  at  Rome  in  the 
writings  of  Molinos,  and  in  France  under  the  auspices  of  Madame 
Guyon  and  Fenelon. 


NOTES.  451 

NOTE  IX.    Page  309. 

BESSE,  in  his  voluminous  Collection  of  the  Sufferings  of  the 
People  called  Quakers,  relates,  that  Lydia  Wardel,  of  Newbury,  in 
New  England,  a  convert  to  Quakerism,  found  herself  inwardly 
prompted  to  appear  in  a  public  assembly  "  in  a  very  unusual  man 
ner,  and  such  as  was  exceeding  hard  and  self-denying  to  her  nat 
ural  disposition,  she  being  a  woman  of  exemplary  modesty  in  all  her 
behaviour.  The  duty  and  concern  she  lay  under  was  that  of  going 
into  their  church  at  Newbury  naked,  as  a  token  of  that  miserable 
condition  which  she  esteemed  them  in."  "  But  they,  instead  of 
religiously  reflecting  on  their  own  condition,  which  she  came  in  that 
manner  to  represent  to  them,  fell  into  a  rage  and  presently  laid 
hands  on  her, "  &c.  He  also  notices  the  case  of  "  Deborah  Wil 
son,  a  young  woman  of  very  modest  and  retired  life,  and  of  a  sober 
conversation,  having  passed  naked  through  the  streets,  as  a  sign 
against  the  cruelty  and  oppression  of  the  rulers. " 

George  Bishop,  another  Quaker  writer,  thus  relates  the  case  of 
Deborah  Wilson.  "  She  was  a  modest  woman,  of  a  retired  life  and 
sober  conversation  ;  and  bearing  a  great  burden  for  the  hardness 
and  cruelty  of  the  people,  she  went  through  the  town  of  Salem  na 
ked,  as  a  sign ;  which  she  having  in  part  performed,  was  laid  hold 
on,  and  bound  over  to  appear  at  the  next  court  of  Salem,  where  the 
wicked  rulers  sentenced  her  to  be  whipt."  —  New  England  Judged. 
The  writings  of  Besse,  Bishop,  and  some  others,  who  were  foolish 
enough  to  defend  the  extravagance  that  they  had  too  much  sense  to 
commit,  were  the  expiring  sighs  of  Quaker  nonsense  and  frenzy. 
They  are  still  mentioned  with  respect  by  some  modern  Quakers, 
who  praise,  instead  of  reading  them ;  as  the  sincere  but  frantic  zeal 
of  Loyola  and  Xavier  is  still  commended  by  their  sly  successors, 
who  have  inherited  the  name  and  the  manners,  without  the  spirit 
that  distinguished  the  original  Jesuits.  With  a  great  proportion  of 
its  modern  professors  Quakerism  is  far  less  influential  as  a  doctrinal 
system  than  as  a  system  of  manners. 

Since  the  infancy  of  Quakerism,  various  eruptions  of  the  primi 
tive  frenzy  have  occurred.  But  they  have  all  been  partial  and  short 
lived.  The  most  remarkable  occurred  in  Connecticut  in  the  begin 
ning  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Even  in  the  close  of  that  century, 
as  I  was  assured  by  a  respectable  person,  who  was  a  witness  of  the 
fact,  a  Quaker  walked  naked  for  several  days  successively  at  Rich 
mond,  in  Virginia,  as  a  sign  of  the  times.  Nathaniel  Prior,  a  worthy 
Quaker  of  London,  informed  me,  that,  at  a  meeting  of  his  fellow-sec 
taries  at  which  he  was  present,  in  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  cen 
tury,  one  member,  suddenly  starting  up,  announced  that  he  was  direct 
ed  by  the  Spirit  to  walk  in  Lombard  Street  without  his  breeches.  He 
was  instantly  disowned  and  expelled  by  the  Quaker  Society.  The 
progressive  diminution  of  Quaker  extravagance  has  been  attended 
with  a  progressive  increase  of  acknowledged  insanity  among  the 
Quakers,  —  in  whose  society  the  numbers  of  the  insane  bear  a  great- 


462  NOTES. 

er  proportion  to  the  whole  mass  than  in  any  other  Christian  sect  or 
association. 

It  had  been  well  if  the  government  of  Massachusetts  had  inflicted 
punishment  on  the  disgusting  violations  of  decency  avowed  by  Besse 
and  Bishop,  without  extending  its  severity  to  the  bare  profession  of 
Quakerism.  This  injustice  was  occasioned  by  the  conviction  that 
these  outrages  were  the  legitimate  fruits  of  Quaker  principles ;  a 
conviction,  which,  it  appears,  the  language  even  of  those  Quakers 
who  were  themselves  guiltless  of  outrage,  tended  strongly  to  confirm. 
It  is  only  such  language  on  the  part  of  the  Quakers  that  can  acquit 
their  adversaries  of  the  ingenious  inhumanity  that  pervades  the  rea 
soning  of  persecutors,  and  holds  men  responsible  for  all  the  conse 
quences  that  may  be  logically  deduced  from  their  principles,  though 
rejected  and  denied  by  themselves.  The  apology  of  the  magistrates 
of  New  England  is  thus  expressed  by  Cotton  Mather :  —  "I  appeal  to 
all  the  reasonable  part  of  mankind,  whether  the  infant  colonies  of 
New  England  had  not  cause  to  guard  themselves  against  these  dan 
gerous  villains.  It  was  also  thought  that  the  very  Quakers  them 
selves  would  say,  that,  if  they  had  got  into  a  corner  of  the  world, 
and  with  immense  toil  and  charge  made  a  wilderness  habitable,  on 
purpose  there  to  be  undisturbed  in  the  exercises  of  their  worship, 
they  would  never  bear  to  have  New  Englanders  come  among  them 
and  interrupt  their  public  worship,  and  endeavour  to  seduce  their 
children  from  it ;  yea,  and  repeat  such  endeavours  after  mild  en 
treaties  first,  and  then  just  banishments  to  oblige  their  departure." 
Yet  Mather  deplores  and  condemns  the  extreme  severities  which 
were  ultimately  inflicted  by  his  countrymen  upon  the  Quakers.  It 
was  one  of  the  privileges  of  Israel  that  the  people  shall  dwell  alone  ; 
and  the  expected  fruition  of  a  similar  privilege  was  one  of  the 
motives  that  led  the  Puritans  to  exchange  the  charms  of  their  native 
land  for  the  gloom  of  a  desolate  wilderness. 

A  story  is  told  by  Whitelocke  strongly  illustrative  of  the  singular 
ity  with  which  the  Quakers  of  those  times  combined  all  that  was 
frantic  in  action  with  all  that  was  dignified  and  affecting  in  suffering. 
Some  Quakers  at  Hasington,  in  Northumberland,  having  interrupted 
a  minister  employed  in  divine  service,  were  severely  beaten  by  the 
people.  Instead  of  resisting,  they  went  out  of  the  church,  and,  fall 
ing  on  their  knees,  besought  God  to  pardon  their  persecutors,  who 
knew  not  what  they  did,  —  and  afterwards  addressing  the  people, 
so  convinced  them  of  the  cruelty  of  their  violence,  that  their 
auditors  fell  a  quarrelling  among  themselves,  and  beat  one  another 
more  than  they  had  formerly  beaten  the  Quakers. 

The  Quakers  have  always  delighted  to  exaggerate  the  persecu 
tions  encountered  by  their  sectarian  society.  An  illustrious  French 
traveller  has  been  so  far  deceived  by  their  vague  declamations  on 
this  topic,  as  to  assert  that  Quakers  were  at  one  time  put  to  the  tor 
ture  in  New  England.  Kochefoucauld's  Travels. 


NOTES. 


NOTE  X.     Page  322. 

UPON  this  occasion  Cotton  Mather  observes  :  —  "  Such  has  been 
the  jealous  disposition  of  our  New  Englanders  about  their  dearly 
bought  privileges,  and  such  also  has  been  the  various  understanding 
of  the  people  about  the  extent  of  these  privileges,  that,  of  all  the 
agents  which  they  have  sent  over  unto  the  court  of  England  for  now 
forty  years  together,  I  know  not  any  one  who  did  not  at  his  return 
meet  with  some  very  froward  entertainment  among  his  countrymen  ; 
and  there  may  be  the  wisdom  of  the  Holy  and  Righteous  God,  as 
well  as  the  malice  of  the  evil  one,  acknowledged  in  the  ordering  of 
such  temptations." 

Norton,  before  his  departure  for  England,  expressed  a  strong  ap 
prehension  that  the  business  he  was  required  to  undertake  would  is 
sue  disastrously  to  himself.  Mather  adds,  "  In  the  spring  before 
his  going  for  England,  he  preached  an  excellent  sermon  unto  the 
representatives  of  the  whole  colony  assembled  at  the  court  of  elec 
tion,  wherein  I  take  particular  notice  of  this  passage  :  —  Moses  was 
the  meekest  man  on  earth;  yet  it  went  ill  with  Moses,  '/  is  said,  for 
their  sakes.  How  long  did  Moses  live  at  Meribah  1  Sure  I  am,  it 
killed  him  in  a  short  time  f  a  man  of  as  good  a  temper  as  could  be 
expected  from  a  mere  man," 

It  might  have  been  expected,  that  Norton,  whose  death  was  thus  in 
a  manner  the  fruit  of  his  exertions  to  extend  religious  liberty  in  the 
colony,  would  have  escaped  the  reproach  of  persecution.  But  he 
had  given  mortal  offence  to  the  Quakers  by  promoting  the  prosecu 
tions  against  the  Quaker  enthusiasts  in  New  England.  And  after 
his  death,  certain  of  those  sectaries  published  at  London  A  Repre 
sentation  to  King  and  Parliament,  wherein,  pretending  to  report 
some  Remarkable  Judgments  upon  their  Persecutors,  they  inserted  the 
following  passage:  — "  John  Norton,  chief  priest  at  Boston,  by  the 
immediate  power  of  the  Lord,  was  smitten ;  and  as  he  was  sinking 
down  by  the  fireside,  being  under  just  judgment,  he  confessed  the 
hand  of  the  Lord  was  upon  him,  and  so  he  died."  Mather.  The 
Romish  fables,  respecting  the  deaths  of  Luther,  Calvin,  Bucer,  and 
Beza,  are  hardly  more  replete  with  folly,  untruth,  and  presumption, 
than  some  of  these  Quaker  interpretations  of  Providence.  Their 
authors,  like  many  other  persons  involved  in  religious  contentions, 
or  exposed  to  persecution  for  religion's  sake,  mistook  an  ardent  zeal 
in  behalf  of  what  they  esteemed  divine  truth  for  a  complete  subjec 
tion  of  mind  to  the  divine  will,  and  an  entire  identification  of  their 
views  and  purposes  with  it ;  practically  regardless  of  their  own  re 
maining  infirmity,  and  forgetting,  that,  while  we  continue  to  be  clothed 
with  humanity,  we  know  only  in  part,  and  can  see  but  darkly.  En 
largement  of  view  is  always  attended  with  increase  of  charity  ;  and 
the  cultivation  of  our  charity  at  once  refines  and  enlarges  our  view. 


464  NOTES. 


NOTE  XL     Page  325. 

WINTHROP  the  younger  was  in  the  bloom  of  manhood,  accom 
plished  by  learning  and  travel,  and  the  heir  of  a  large  estate,  when 
he  readily  joined  with  his  father  in  promoting  and  accompanying  an 
expedition  of  emigrants  to  New  England.  They  were  indeed,  as 
Dryden  said  of  Ormond  and  Ossory,  "  a  father  and  a  son  only  wor 
thy  of  each  other."  Cotton  Mather  has  preserved  a  letter  written  by 
Winthrop  the  elder  to  his  son,  while  the  one  was  governor  of  Mas 
sachusetts,  and  the  other  of  Connecticut.  I  shall  be  excused  for  tran 
scribing  some  part  of  an  epistle  so  beautiful  in  itself,  and  so  striking 
ly  characteristic  of  the  fathers  of  New  England.  "  You  are  the 
chief  of  two  families.  I  had  by  your  mother  three  sons  and  three 
daughters  ;  and  I  had  with  her  a  large  portion  of  outward  estate. 
These  are  now  all  gone  ;  mother  gone  ;  brethren  and  sisters  gone  : 
you  only  are  left  to  see  the  vanity  of  these  temporal  things,  and 
learn  wisdom  thereby  which  may  be  of  more  use  to  you,  through 
the  Lord's  blessing,  than  all  that  inheritance  which  might  have  be 
fallen  you  :  And  for  which,  this  may  stay  and  quiet  your  heart, 
that  God  is  able  to  give  you  more  than  this ;  and  that  it  being  spent 
in  the  furtherance  of  his  work,  which  has  here  prospered  so  well 
through  his  power  hitherto,  you  and  yours  may  certainly  expect  a 
liberal  portion  in  the  prosperity  and  blessing  thereof  hereafter ;  and 
the  rather,  because  it  was  not  forced  from  you  by  a  father's  power, 
but  freely  resigned  by  yourself,  out  of  a  loving  and  filial  respect  un 
to  me,  and  your  own  readiness  unto  the  work  itself.  From  whence, 
as  I  do  often  take  occasion  to  bless  the  Lord  for  you,  so  do  I  also 
commend  you  and  yours  to  his  fatherly  blessing,  for  a  plentiful  re 
ward  to  be  rendered  unto  you.  And  doubt  not,  my  dear  son,  but 
let  your  faith  be  built  upon  his  promise  and  faithfulness,  that,  as  he 
hath  carried  you  hitherto  through  many  perils,  and  provided  liber 
ally  for  you,  so  he  will  do  for  the  time  to  come,  and  will  never  fail 
you  nor  forsake  you.  My  son,  the  Lord  knows  how  dear  thou  art 
to  me,  and  that  my  care  has  been  more  for  thee  than  for  myself. 
But  I  know  thy  prosperity  depends  not  on  my  care,  nor  on 
thine  own,  but  on  the  blessing  of  our  Heavenly  Father  :  neither  doth 
it  on  the  things  of  this  world,  but  on  the  light  of  God's  countenance 
through  the  merit  and  mediation  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  It  is  that 
only  which  can  give  us  peace  of  conscience  with  contentation ; 
which  can  as  well  make  our  lives  happy  and  comfortable  in  a  mean 
estate  as  in  a  great  abundance.  But  if  you  weigh  things  aright,  and 
sum  up  all  the  turnings  of  divine  providence  together,  you  shall  find 
great  advantage.  The  Lord  hath  brought  us  to  a  good  land,  a  land 
where  we  enjoy  outward  peace  and  liberty,  and  above  all  the  bless 
ings  of  the  gospel,  without  the  burden  of  impositions  in  matters  of 
religion.  Many  thousands  there  are  who  would  give  great  estates 
to  enjoy  our  condition.  Labor,  therefore,  my  good  son,  to  increase 
our  thankfulness  to  God  for  all  his  mercies  to  thee,  especially  for 


NOTES.  465 

that  he  hath  revealed  his  everlasting  good-will  to  thee  in  Jesus 
Christ,  and  joined  thee  to  the  visible  body  of  his  church  in  the  fel 
lowship  of  his  people,  and  hath  saved  thee  in  all  thy  travels  abroad 
from  being  infected  with  the  vices  of  those  countries  where  thou 
hast  been  (a  mercy  vouchsafed  but  unto  few  young  gentlemen 
travellers).  Let  Him  have  the  honor  of  it  who  kept  thee.  He  it 
was  who  gave  thee  favor  in  the  eyes  of  all  with  whom  thou  hadst 
to  do,  both  by  sea  and  land ;  he  it  is  who  hath  given  thee  a  gift  in 
understanding  and  art ;  and  he  it  is  who  hath  provided  thee  a  bless 
ing  in  marriage,  a  comfortable  help,  and  many  sweet  children. 
And  therefore  I  would  have  you  to  love  him  again  and  serve  him, 
and  trust  him  for  the  time  to  come." 

Winthrop  the  elder  not  only  performed  actions  worthy  to  be  writ 
ten,  but  produced  writings  worthy  to  be  read.  Yet  his  Journal,  or 
History,  as  it  has  been  termed  in  the  late  edition  by  Mr.  Savage,  is 
very  inferior  in  spirit  and  interest  to  his  Letters.  Winthrop  the 
younger  was  one  of  the  greatest  philosophers  of  his  age,  the  asso 
ciate  of  Robert  Boyle  and  Bishop  Wilkins  in  projecting  and  found 
ing  the  Royal  Society  of  London,  and  the  correspondent  of  Tycho 
Brahe,  Galileo,  Kepler,  Milton,  Lord  Napier,  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  Sir 
Henry  Wotton,  and  various  others  of  the  most  distinguished  charac 
ters  in  Europe. 


NOTE  XII.     Page  351. 

AMONG  many  interesting  and  romantic  adventures  related  by 
Mather,  Neal,  Hutchinson,  Dwight,  and  other  New  England  writers, 
as  having  occurred  during  Philip's  War,  there  is  one  incident  which 
excited  much  wonder  and  speculation  at  the  time,  and  has  since  de 
rived  an  increase  of  interest  from  the  explanation  which  it  received 
after  the  death  of  the  individual  principally  concerned  in  it.  In 
1675,  the  town  of  Hadley  was  alarmed  by  the  sudden  approach  of 
a  body  of  Indians  during  the  time  of  public  worship,  and  the  people 
were  thrown  into  a  confusion  that  betokened  an  unresisted  massa 
cre.  Suddenly  a  grave,  elderly  person  appeared  in  the  midst  of 
them.  Whence  he  came,  or  who  he  was,  nobody  could  tell.  In  his 
mien  and  dress  he  differed  from  the  rest  of  the  people.  He  not 
only  encouraged  them  to  defend  themselves,  but,  putting  himself 
at  their  head,  rallied,  instructed,  and  led  them  on  to  encounter  the 
enemy,  who  were  defeated  and  put  to  flight.  As  suddenly,  the  de 
liverer  of  Hadley  disappeared ;  and  the  people  were  left  in  a  state 
of  perplexity  and  amazement,  and  utterly  unable  to  account  for  this 
singular  phenomenon.  After  his  death,  it  was  known  to  have  been 
Goffe,  the  regicide,  who  dwelt  somewhere  in  the  neighbourhood,  but 
in  such  deep  sequestration  that  none  except  those  who  were  intrusted 
with  the  secret  were  ever  able  to  make  the  remotest  approach  to  a 
discovery  of  his  retreat.  Whalley  resided  with  him ;  and  they  had 

VOL.  r. 


466  NOTES. 

some  years  before  been  joined  by  another  of  the  regicides,  Colonel 
Dixwell.  They  frequently  changed  their  place  of  abode,  and  gave 
the  name  of  Ebenezer  to  every  spot  that  afforded  them  shelter.  They 
had  many  friends  both  in  England  and  in  the  New  England  States, 
with  some  of  whom  they  maintained  a  close  correspondence.  They 
obtained  constant  and  exact  intelligence  of  every  thing  that  passed 
in  England,  and  were  unwilling  to  resign  all  hopes  of  deliverance. 
Their  expectations  were  suspended  on  the  fulfilment  of  the  prophe 
cies  of  Scripture,  which  they  earnestly  studied.  They  had  no  doubt 
that  the  execution  of  the  late  king's  judges  was  the  slaying  of  the 
witnesses,  in  the  Apocalypse,  and  were  greatly  disappointed  when 
the  year  1666  elapsed  without  any  remarkable  event ;  but  still  nat 
tered  themselves  with  the  notion  of  some  error  in  the  commonly  re 
ceived  chronology.  The  strict  inquisition  that  was  made  for  them 
by  the  royal  commissioners  and  others  renders  their  concealment  in 
a  country  so  thinly  peopled,  and  where  every  stranger  was  the  object 
of  immediate  and  curious  notice,  truly  surprising.  It  appears  that 
they  were  befriended  and  much  esteemed  for  their  piety  by  persons 
who  regarded  the  great  action  in  which  they  had  participated  with 
unqualified  disapprobation.  Hutchinson. 


NOTE  XIII.     Page  353. 

THAT  the  jealousy  and  suspicion  with  which  the  New  England 
States  were  regarded  by  the  English  court  had  not  slumbered  in  the 
interim  may  be  inferred  from  the  following  passages  extracted  from 
the  Journal  of  John  Evelyn,  the  author  of  Sylva,  who,  in  the  reign 
of  Charles  the  Second,  was  one  of  the  Commissioners  of  Trade  and 
Plantations.  "  26  May,  1671.  What  we  the  commissioners  most 
insisted  on  was,  to  know  the  condition  of  New  England,  which  ap 
pearing  to  be  veiy  independent  as  to  their  regard  to  Old  England  or 
his  Majesty,  rich  and  strong  as  they  now  were,  there  were  great  de 
bates  in  what  style  to  write  to  them  ;  for  the  condition  of  that  colony 
was  such  that  they  were  able  to  contest  with  all  other  plantations 
about  them,  and  there  was  fear  of  their  breaking  from  all  depend 
ence  on  this  nation ;  his  Majesty  therefore  commended  this  affair 
more  expressly."  "  Some  of  our  council  were  for  sending  them 
a  menacing  letter,  which  those  who  better  understood  the  peevish 
and  touchy  humor  of  that  colony  were  utterly  against."  "  6th  June. 
We  understood  they  were  a  people  almost  on  the  brink  of  renounc 
ing  any  dependence  on  the  crown."  "  3d  August.  The  matter  in 
debate  was,  whether  we  should  send  a  deputy  to  New  England,  re 
quiring  them  of  Massachusetts  to  restore  such  to  their  limits  and  re 
spective  possessions  as  had  petitioned  the  council ;  this  to  be  the 
open  commission  only,  but  in  truth  with  secret  instructions  to  inform 
us  of  the  condition  of  those  colonies,  and  whether  they  were  of  such 
power  as  to  be  able  to  resist  his  Majesty,  and  declare  for  them- 


NOTES.  467 

selves  as  independent  of  the  crown,  which  we  were  told,  and  which 
of  late  years  made  them  refractory."  "  12th  February,  1672.  We 
also  deliberated  on  some  fit  person  to  go  as  commissioner  to  inspect 
their  actions  in  New  England,  and  from  time  to  time  report  how  that 
people  stood  affected." 


NOTE  XIV.     Page  428. 

A  GOOD  history  of  Harvard  University,  by  its  librarian,  Benjamin 
Peirce,  has  been  recently  given  to  the  world.  In  the  collegiate  es 
tablishment,  says  this  author,  "  the  substantial  properties  of  the  Eng 
lish  universities  were  retained,  while  their  pompous  and  imposing 
ceremonies  were  in  a  great  measure  excluded."  —  "  The  first  Com 
mencement  took  place  on  the  second  Tuesday  of  August,  1642. 
Upon  this  novel  and  auspicious  occasion,  the  venerable  fathers  of 
the  land,  the  governor,  magistrates,  and  ministers  from  all  parts, 
with  others  in  great  numbers,  repaired  to  Cambridge,  and  attended, 
with  delight,  to  refined  displays  of  European  learning  on  a  spot 
which  but  just  before  was  the  abode  of  savages."  —  "  In  looking  over 
the  list  of  early  benefactions  to  the  College,  we  are  amused  when  we 
read  of  a  number  of  sheep  bequeathed  by  one  man,  a  quantity  of  cot 
ton  cloth  worth  nine  shillings  presented  by  another,  a  pewter  flagon 
worth  ten  shillings  by  a  third,  a  fruit-dish,  a  sugar-spoon,  a  silver- 
tipped  jug,  one  great  salt,  one  small  trencher-salt,  by  others  ;  and 
of  presents  or  legacies  amounting  severally  to  five  shillings,  nine 
shillings,  one  pound,  two  pounds,  &c.,  all  faithfully  recorded,  with 
the  names  of  their  respective  donors.  How  soon  does  a  little  reflec 
tion  change  any  disposition  we  may  have  to  smile  into  a  feeling  of 
respect  and  even  of  admiration !  What,  in  fact,  were  these  humble 
benefactions  ?  They  were  contributions  from  the  '  res  angusta  domi ' ; 
from  pious,  virtuous,  enlightened  penury,  to  the  noblest  of  all  causes, 
the  advancement  of  education.  The  donations  were  small,  for  the 
people  were  poor ;  they  leave  no  doubt  as  to  the  motives  which  actu 
ated  the  donors ;  they  remind  us  of  the  offering  from  '  every  one 
whose  heart  stirred  him  up,  and  every  one  whom  his  spirit  made 
willing,  to  the  work  of  the  tabernacle  of  the  congregation ' ;  and, 
like  the  widow's  mite,  indicate  a  respect  and  zeal  for  the  object, 
which  would  have  done  greater  things,  had  the  means  been  more 
abundant."  How  much  nobler  these  humble  tributes  than  the  mu 
nificent  donations  of  bigot  or  robber  princes  to  the  colleges  of  Eu 
rope  !  —  "It  was,  perhaps,  fortunate,  that,  for  so  long  a  period  after 
the  foundation  of  the  College,  and  before  many  other  institutions  had 
sprung  up  to  divide  the  attention  of  the  public,  this  '  school  of  the 
prophets '  should  have  experienced  no  individual  patronage  of  suffi 
cient  magnitude  to  supersede  the  care  and  support  of  the  community 
at  large.  Its  long  dependence  on  the  whole  people,  by  whom  it 
was  cherished  with  parental  fondness,  tended  to  secure  and  perpet- 


468  NOTES. 

uate  their  affection  for  the  College,  and  even  for  learning  itself;  and 
to  this  circumstance  may  probably  be  traced,  in  some  degree,  that 
general  interest  in  the  cause  of  education  for  which  New  England 
has  always  been  distinguished."  Peirce. 

In  the  course  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  College  was  enriched 
by  many  liberal  donations  from  individuals  in  Britain,  as  well  as  in 
America.  The  most  notable  of  its  British  benefactors  were  Samuel 
Holden,  governor  of  the  Bank  of  England,  a  member  of  parliament, 
and  a  leading  person  among  the  English  Dissenters,  and  a  family 
named  Hollis  (Dissenters  likewise),  distinguished  through  successive 
generations  for  mercantile  industry  and  opulence,  and  for  the  most 
generous,  untiring,  and  judicious  philanthropy.  Peirce  has  pre 
served  an  interesting  account  of  these  and  other  friends  and  patrons 
of  this  venerable  institution  ;  remarking  of  the  Hollises  in  particu 
lar,  with  unexaggerated  encomium,  that  they  formed  "  one  of  the 
most  extraordinary  families  that  Providence  ever  raised  up  for  the 
benefit  of  the  human  race."  Such  were  the  great  merchants  of 
Britain,  before  they  were  debauched  by  a  rage  for  fashionable  and 
aristocratical  distinction. 


Since  the  foregoing  note  was  written,  I  have  had  the  pleasure  of 
reading  a  far  ampler  and  superior  history  of  Harvard  University, 
by  its  excellent  and  accomplished  president,  Josiah  Quincy.  If 
every  thing  else  that  has  been  written  about  America  should  perish, 
that  work  would  secure  to  New  England  a  glorious  and  imperish 
able  name.  No  other  country  ever  produced  a  seat  of  learning  so 
honorable  to  its  founders  as  Harvard  University,  —  and  never  did  a 
noble  institution  obtain  a  worthier  historian.  President  Quincy's 
account  of  the  transition  of  the  social  system  of  Massachusetts,  from 
an  entire  and  punctilious  intertexture  of  church  and  state  to  the 
restriction  of  municipal  government  to  civil  affairs  and  occupations, 
is  very  curious  and  interesting,  and  admirably  fills  up  an  important 
void  in  New  England's  history.  Son  of  one  of  the  ablest  and  most 
generous  champions  of  his  country's  independence,  President  Quin 
cy  has  given  additional  lustre  to  a  name  renowned  at  Runnymede 
and  dear  to  the  liberty  and  literature  of  North  America. 


END    OF    VOLUME    I. 


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